Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (geographic names)/Archives/2009/March

Why two pages?

Sorry, this has no doubt been asked before, but what's the rationale for having two separate pages called NC (geographic names) and NC (places)? Can't the information on this page be merged with the other, or split between the main WP:NC page and the other?--Kotniski (talk) 11:59, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

I second this motion. Jasy jatere (talk) 17:34, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Is there any opposition to the merger idea in principle, then? If people have any specific reason for keeping the pages apart, it will help if they say now, before someone (me, probably) wastes a lot of time working on the merged version. And if the pages are to remain separate, we should at least rename one or both of them so that their alleged different purposes are made clear.--Kotniski (talk) 23:20, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

stylistic changes

There are some passages on this page which are very clumsy. I copy-edited a bit of it, but was told that I should discuss this first. So here goes the diff http://en.wiki.x.io/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%3ANaming_conventions_%28geographic_names%29&diff=263604054&oldid=263594603. I propose to implement the changes as stated, feel free to comment on them. Most are weeding out redundancy, the only removed content is a confused passage about Pisa, which does not seem to matter for NC, given that both Italians and English call that city the same. From the context, it is obvious that there is a need for an example, so I added an obscure place in Turkey, but any other example which looks very "local" is fine with me Jasy jatere (talk) 17:33, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

I think the passage as it stands is rather waffly (waffley?), but I don't see what point would be made by the Turkish example either.--Kotniski (talk) 23:29, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

I think the main point would be "Even if the name looks very obscure (loads of diacritics), keep the local name if no English name exists." Arguably a minor point. If you want to remove it, I will not object. Jasy jatere (talk) 11:09, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

We already say that. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:52, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

• That would be the assertion that The river Üçköprü in Turkey for instance is notable for being a geographical body, but does not have a widely established English name. I doubt that the Üçköprü is notable, and we should not pre-empt that decision. But if it is widely known, then it is likely, although I am not certain, that Üçköprü is its English name. (This is particularly problematic for Anatolian places, some of which, like the Halys, are traditionally known by classical names.) Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:38, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Rename rather than merge

Actually, having thought about the merger (see #Why two pages? above), it seems that the scope of the two pages is different, and it might not be easy to merge them. The other page seems to be a true "naming conventions" page, dealing with the choice of article titles, while this one is rather more general (doesn't contain so much detailed guidance) but deals with issues of what names to choose within articles as well. So rather than have two pages with names that imply they cover the same topic, I would propose renaming this one to something like WP:Resolving place-name conflicts - or something better someone may come up with, just not "Naming conventions (xxx)". Thoughts?--Kotniski (talk) 16:06, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Naming conventions in the strict sense only refer to the title of the article, which is used in the address bar and at the very top of the page. How the topic of the article is treated in the body is an issue of the Manual of Style, I suppose. http://en.wiki.x.io/wiki/Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(places) contains the stuff for article naming, and should therefore stay as a Naming Convention. http://en.wiki.x.io/wiki/Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(geographic_names) contains other information, as noted by Kotniski. Therefore, the latter page should be moved to some name which does not imply that it is a naming convention. Hence, I second Kotniski's proposal. I also have no better target title to offer, so WP:Resolving place-name conflicts has my support. Jasy jatere (talk) 16:28, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm moving this to Wikipedia:Resolving placename conflicts, then, since there are no objections.--Kotniski (talk) 12:21, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Sorry to have missed this; I object. While this page does discuss the context of text, as it should, its principal purpose is to identify how articles on geographic places are titled. Reverting move; take it to WP:RM. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:27, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

What do you suggest, then? It's clearly idiotic to have two different pages called NC (places) and NC (geographic names). Would you merge them, rename one of them, or what? --Kotniski (talk) 16:51, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Merge them. Part of "places" belongs here, although very little; part of it is already in WP:NC (settlements). Some of it is simply wrong: not English and not what we do. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:24, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

• To allow time for thought and discussion, I intend to deal with one grand section of WP:PLACES a day; but I think it can be divided between here, WP:NC (settlements), and a revived WP:NC (landforms) without loss. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:20, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

How about merging all those four pages into one?--Kotniski (talk) 12:39, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree. Furthermore, I think there is no need to repeat what is said in WP:UE. If we have one NC for geographical things, which only treats what is particular about geography, that would be sufficient. Administrative subdivision is one such thing that is particular to geography, another thing would be geographical disputes of the #Hybrid_names type.

The reason I have not supported merging in WP:NC (settlements) is that it is very long, and controversial. But I plan to include it here by reference. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:49, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

NC (settlements) doesn't seem particularly long to me. There is quite a long list of sections for particular countries, but that could be compacted. Is there anything controversial on it? I know there was a lot of fuss about US cities and the city-comma-state convention, but I thought that had been sorted out.--Kotniski (talk) 10:51, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

There is a sufficient majority to keep the present compromise stable; but the user who objects to all pre-disambiguation is still riding his hobby-horse on talk. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:38, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

• I have included a recommendation for oblast, oblasts. I don't think WP:PLACES is right to recommend local names for all administrative subdivisions, and I oppose the pedantic oblast', oblastiy. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:48, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

I think merge is better: both pages discuss similar issues. Yes, they are not identical, but a user reading one would likely benefit from reading the other one as well. Thus, I support merge, while keeping the gist of both pages intact.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 20:54, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Lyon

I have ventured to change this example of a native name being more common than the anglicization to Livorno/Leghorn. Lyon/Lyons is in part an Anglo-American difference, which is another guideline entirely. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 15:09, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

• I particularly like the example of Paris. The English and the French form are spelled the same, but are clearly distinguished by the terminal sibilant. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 15:10, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

What is a common modern name?

I once had a japanese collegue, who stated that an average japanese can not read a japanese book from the 1960-s. To me this sounded frightening, but after a few years of 'back of the head' thinking, I realised that that this is the case in my country as well. I summon my opinon. Writing the name in a modern style is an effective way to change history. this is why regimes changes names. Young readers will soon loose the ability to read older sources as the names are unknown. If an academy, newspaper, or club of interest of some sort, decides to: from hereon use a new name of desire (for whatever reason), should a whole community follow? (A example from the swedish language authority: it stated the use of webbpage instead of hemsida(homepage), they recommend english misspelled words instead of what was commonly used by then. The reason stated was something about it was not necessary the page of the home and it could be several pages. You could laugh if not the consequence. Now every magasine and official department in Sweden use the official word webbpage, it has become a COMMONLY KNOWN MODERN NAME. This to me seems as if 'unknowing' people with big authority has changed a language to the worse. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gurrapurrasurra (talk • contribs) 19:55, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

Australia and New Zealand

The following texts were removed from WP:NC(places). In case we want to salvage anything, like the WikiProject links, I put them here:

Australia

Geographic features will be named according to the unqualified [[Feature]] format if unambiguous. Ambiguously named features will normally follow the [[Geographic feature (State)]] format, with the following exceptions:

• Ambiguously named features that cross state borders use [[Geographic Feature (Australia)]];
• Ambiguously named features that are ambiguous within a state use districts or regions, [[Geographic Feature (LGA, State)]], e.g. Mount Eliza (Gippsland, Victoria) (although option may exist here of simply using Mount Eliza (Gippsland) where there is little risk of confusing the location of the feature);
• Ambiguously named features that are co-located and therefore cannot be distinguished on location use [[Geographic Feature (type)]], e.g. Wolfe Creek (crater) and Wolfe Creek (watercourse) (used only where there is no other Wolfe Creek outside of the Australian state in question); and
• Pathological case: Features that include co-located features of different types AND features in other states use [[Geographic Feature (State-ian type)]] e.g. Arthur River (Western Australian river).
  • where appropriate, due consideration should be given to the guidance contained in Wikipedia:WikiProject Lakes#Naming, Wikipedia:WikiProject Mountains#Naming conventions and Wikipedia:WikiProject Rivers#Naming

New Zealand

Since most places in New Zealand have unique names, the standard convention (where it is necessary to distinguish a place in New Zealand from one elsewhere) is simply to use the form "Placename, New Zealand", irrespective of whether the place is a town, river, or whatever. In those rare instances where two places in New Zealand have the same name then the following rules are used:

• If both places are the same type of place (e.g., both towns), the Regional names are used (for example, "Waverley, Taranaki" and "Waverley, Otago").
• If the two places are different types of place, then parentheses are used to disambiguate (for example, "Lake Tekapo" and "Lake Tekapo (town)")

Rules of Maori place names are still under discussion, but at present, where the usual name of a place is Maori, macrons are not used in the name. Where the usual name is English but there is also a Maori name, macrons are used in the Maori name. Thus Whakatane is simply Whakatane, but Christchurch is also listed within the article as Ōtautahi. In the rare instance where a place officially has both Maori and English names and both are used equally, both names are used in the article title, separated by an oblique (e.g., Whakaari/White Island). The order in which the two names are listed is not fixed.

Note: conflicts with general Wikipedia:Naming conventions (landforms)#Rivers dab not with comma

Naming conventions naming

Having merged NC_(places) in with this, I think we should now rename this page to WP:Naming conventions (places). It's a snappier title, and is consistent with the names of other NC pages (e.g. WP:Naming conventions (people) rather than WP:Naming conventions (personal names)).

Also I would have thought it would make sense to rename all the country-specific guidelines to have the same form: "WP:Naming conventions (name_of_country)" would seem best. Although I suppose some of them might not be restricted solely to matters of naming.--Kotniski (talk) 16:11, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

I should prefer not to; I'm fond of the present name, and it provides a very widely used short cut: WP:NCGN. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:39, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

The shortcut would still work; and I'm sure you'd grow fond of the new name too... Any more objective arguments one way or the other?--Kotniski (talk) 09:44, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

By the same logic, we could just make sure WP:PLACE redirects here, if the bot has not already done it. I prefer to have the abbreviation WP:NCGN abbreviate the title actually on this page; if several people agree in thinking otherwise, fine. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 14:57, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

I think it is weird to have a naming conventions for names. It is not names that we name, it is things, people, places. So, my preference is for NC_(places), but I don't really botherJasy jatere (talk) 10:05, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

random hist hits in google scholar

the following passage seems to have as aim to reduce google scholar as a source for usage

Please remember that Google Scholar and Google Books are largely random selections out of the whole corpus of English writing. If the results could easily have arisen by chance (for example, if there are only half-a-dozen or so valid hits on all the alternatives combined), this is not a good indicator of widespread English usage.

However, if gs is indeed a random sample, it should reflect usage very nicely. For these tests, you actually do want a random sample. I suggest to either change the wording or remove the passage. The only point seems to be that if there are few hits on scholar, then this is not reliable, but that should be clear anyway, and does not merit excursions into random samples. Jasy jatere (talk) 23:13, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

Google Scholar results also have systematic components, and so are not perfectly random. The abuse aimed at by that sentence is taking Google Scholar results, and declaring that Name X "wins" by 4-2; this is plainly meaningless, and a wider or more discriminating sample of English usage is called for. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 01:23, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

OK. Then we should take away the word random, and replace it by "non-representative" or sth along those lines. Jasy jatere (talk) 10:01, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

What aspect of the matter does largely random not cover? Google scholar results are representative; like all systems of representation, the selected body will not always reflect the whole. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 14:55, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

the problem is that "random" is actually a positive term when it comes to sampling, but here we want to put google into a negative light. I think the problem you want to address has to do with sample size rather than with randomness. Jasy jatere (talk) 15:26, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Anyone who doesn't recognize that too small a sample, however random, proves little or nothing will be confused by whatever we say. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 15:50, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

But I've put "imperfectly random", which should cover the matter. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:53, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Survey

I'm conducting a new survey since the last was done 3 years ago (an editors lifetime on Wikipedia) at 2009 Vancouver Vs. Vancouver, Washington Survey. Your input would be most appreciated. Mkdw^talk 21:31, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Missing text

It seems that the following text has been removed from the page (see for example this version):

3. The contents (this applies to all articles using the name in question): The same name as in the title should be used consistently throughout the article. Exceptions are allowed only if there is a widely accepted historic English name for a specific historical context. In cases when a widely accepted historic English name is used, it should be followed by the modern English name in parentheses on the first occurrence of the name in applicable sections of the article in the format: "historical name (modern name)." This resembles linking; it should not be done to the detriment of style. On the other hand, it is probably better to do too often than too rarely. If more than one historic name is applicable for a given historical context, the other names should be added after the modern English name, i.e.: "historical name (English name, other historical names)".

Was it moved to another page? Or can we reinsert it?--Supparluca 12:17, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

I believe I removed this to WP:Manual of Style, where it more appropriately belongs. WP:Naming conventions are primarily about what names we give to pages - we shouldn't be going on at length about the names we use for things elsewhere in articles.--Kotniski (talk) 13:34, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Could you insert a link to the MOS section you moved it to? Actually, this specific guideline was quite helpful in a recent conflict resolution regarding Hungarian names for places in Slovakia, see User:Elonka/Hungarian-Slovakian experiment. Markussep ^Talk 14:22, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

There is one already, but I'll make it more visible.--Kotniski (talk) 14:28, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Actually this is a matter of content, not style. It should at least be summarized here. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 15:12, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

South Tyrol & historical names

Jeez, who has moved the bit about the naming convention on South Tyrol without ever consulting people on the respective page South Tyrol?! Note that this is not another article, it a reference point for practically the whole of WP! So, when you mess here, you might be aware that it has a profound influence elsewhere. Actually, we rely on that list VERY STRONGLY in our work. I restore the section now. It runs:

Multiple local names

There are cases in which the local authority recognizes equally two or more names from different languages, but English discussion of the place is so limited that none of the above tests indicate which of them is widely used in English; so there is no single local name, and English usage is hard to determine.

Experience shows that the straightforward solution of a double or triple name is often unsatisfactory; there are all too many complaints that one or the other name should be first. We also deprecate any discussion of which name the place ought to have.

We recommend choosing a single name, by some objective criterion, even a somewhat arbitrary one. Simple Google tests are acceptable to settle the matter, despite their problems. In the case of the communes of the province of Bolzano-Bozen, there is a linguistic survey of the area, by commune, which has the following advantages:

• It is available on-line, and officially published.
• The proportions of the various language groups are fairly stable.
• Most communes have a large majority, often a 90% majority, of one language group.
• In the few cases where there is a widely used English name, it is usually that of the majority language group.
  • Exception: The population of Merano is almost evenly divided, with a slight German-speaking majority; and Meran is quite often used for it in English. There appears to be sufficient evidence that Merano is more common in English, however.

Where the above tests, therefore, give no indication of a widely used English name, those articles are placed according to the language of the linguistic majority. If these conditions apply elsewhere, this solution may be worth considering.

Also, the section on historical names has now been so flatly worded that its meaning is hardly discernible to those who look for answers on the subject. Gun Powder Ma (talk) 18:23, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Why on earth should so much information on a specific locality be included in a guideline for geographical names all over the world? People can't magic such linguistic surveys into existence for their own regions, so this description of the wonders of this particular survey isn't going to help anyone. Detailed conventions for specific countries should be either on a separate guideline page for the country or in the list of country-specific conventions.--Kotniski (talk) 10:03, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Because it is one of the few examples of a successful, stable, solution to a WP:LAME naming conflict, and it will serve as a model if similar conflicts arise elsewhere; but the stability depends on the virtues of the survey. The ideal solution might be to do what Italy actually does, and have the title of the article on the capital, for example, be seen as either Bolzano or Bozen (and so on) at will, but that is incompatible with WP's file structure. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:50, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

And I don't understand your objections about historical names; what (of substance) do you think it said before that it doesn't say now? Remember that this page is about article naming, not really about use of alternative names within articles - the latter subject is now covered more appropriately at WP:MOS#Geographical items and (even more appropriately) at WP:Proper names.--Kotniski (talk) 10:07, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Exactly Septentrionalis. If you delete the section on South Tyrol one further time, Kotniski, I am filling an incidence report without hesitation. If you do not understand the significance of certain passage in the naming convention, do not edit this article. The South Tyrol solution is actually the product of almost endless discussions in the respective talk pages. I am not prepared to let that be deleted by an overzealous editor, because this would be really a disgrace to the almost endless patience and input many editors have given over months and even years to reach that compromise. We are not going to start over again in hundreds of articles because a single person who has never work on articles related to South Tyrol "did not understand things" here. Any changes to the South Tyrol section should only be put forward by the respectice user community working on articles to the province, you have absolutely no mandate here to redefine an established WP policy. Gun Powder Ma (talk) 00:09, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

There have been many discussions about many geographical naming disputes - if we included this much information about all of them, the page would be ten times longer than it already is. All we need to include is the conclusions and the point that they illustrate, not a massive essay. Then people can find their information, and people looking for other information will be able to find that. I understand everything quite well (I think - you will tell me if there's something I've got wrong), but I would like to make it easy for others to do so too.--Kotniski (talk) 14:59, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

while I can understand the frustration of editors who have mustered a lot of patience to come to a commendable agreement, please remain calm. No one owns this guideline. There is no reason to shout, and I am sure Kotniski has the best intentions. No one wants to delete the South Tyrol work, but maybe a less prominent places than this guideline would also be suitable for it to serve the functions it has (As of now, I have no opinion on this). Jasy jatere (talk) 22:48, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

There are two sections which IMO need clarification: The section on historical names and the one on South Tyrol. For the later, I am going to restore one more sentence which gives vital background information for those who are not acquainted with the naming problem. Please do not edit that passage again without leaving a note before on the Talk:Province of Bolzano-Bozen/Naming.

As for historical names, I strongly suggest we need a section of its own. Why? Because in all those articles on cities, towns, regions etc., which feature a history secion, the question automatically arises whether within this section the entity should be given the modern or historical names, irrespective of what it is called in the rest of the article. Additionally, we have tens of thousands of explicitly historical articles which all need that clarification, too. In terms of accessability, the solution now is wanting because the guide lines on historical names are more like sound bites, scattered over two or three different passages. The guide line on Constantinople is even outright wrong (See footnote 8 in Istanbul). Gun Powder Ma (talk) 01:16, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

I strongly suggest that Gun Powder Ma look at the history of this convention before he comments further; this convention was originally designed to deal chiefly with the use of historical names; despite the recent merge, it still does. Nor does this page contradict what is said at Istanbul; our sentence is an example, not a full treatment of the names of Istanbul, which belongs in article space. (This page does, however, follow WP:UE rather than the decisions of the Turkish Republic; that is the consensus of Wikipedians, and may be the only way to preserve neutrality in these matters.)

What do you actually want to say? Gun Powder Ma (talk) 14:13, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Meran/Merano

Under Wikipedia:Naming conventions (geographic names)#Province of Bolzano-Bozen it says: "Exception: The population of Merano is almost evenly divided, with a slight German-speaking majority; and Meran is quite often used for it in English. There appears to be sufficient evidence that Merano is more common in English, however."
1. The population in the city is: 51.50% German and 48.01% Italian
2. Google searches in English result in a majority for Merano vs. Meran: Merano 1,070,000 Meran 349,000, but with a lot of false positives
3. trying to get these false positives out leads to complete different results, i.e.:

• -hotel Merano 229,000 Meran 228,000 (there are hotels named Meran)
• -hotel -technology Merano 203,000 Meran -203,000 (there is a company named Meran technology)
• -hotel -technology -Allen-Edmonds Merano 193,000 Meran 210,000 (there is a Allen-Edmonds Merano shoe)
• -hotel -technology -Allen-Edmonds -Georg Merano 194,000 Meran 203,000 (There is a designer named Georg Meran)
• -hotel -technology -Allen-Edmonds -Georg -Rancho Merano 192,000 Meran 396,000 (there is a Rancho Merano in Arizona)
• -hotel -technology -Allen-Edmonds -Georg -Rancho -Ristorante Merano 184,000 Meran 198,000 (there are some Ristorante Merano)
• -technology Merano 454,000 Meran 314,000
• -Allen-Edmonds Merano 488,000 Meran 567,000
• -Georg Merano 478,000 Meran 333,000
• -Rancho Merano 481,000 Meran 344,000
• -Ristorante Merano 475,000 Meran 351,000
  

4. Google books Merano 991 Meran 1,980 (-Renata -Georg as these are 2 authors names)
Concluding: To me it is pretty unclear how the the conclusion was reached that there is "sufficient evidence that Merano is more common in English". To me it seems there is no clear evidence for a more common use of either of the two names. Therefore I suggest to delete the line about Meran/Merano and apply the standard naming convention for locations in the province. --noclador (talk) 14:16, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Support (when you add the word "because" in the Google Books search you get only English hits: Merano 637 hits versus Meran 722 hits --Mai-Sachme (talk) 15:37, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Support --Moroderen (talk) 15:48, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't see any evidence here that indicates that there would be any benefit in changing anything. Neither the linguistic split nor the usage statistics are anywhere near decisive - let's just leave things as they are. --Kotniski (talk) 15:57, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

So far we decided following this rule: if there is a remarkable preference in English for one of the two names, we take that one, if not, we take the name used by the local majority. Up to now the exception was Meran/Merano, obviously without a rationale. Although there is no evidence for a clear preference in English, we don't use the name of the local majority. And that's what we want to change for reasons of consistancy. The question is: Why should we maintain this exception? --Mai-Sachme (talk) 16:05, 15 February 2009 (UTC)'

On the substance: there are more false positives for Meran; the chess opening and the hotel in Prague are no more evidence of current English usage on the city than Peking duck determines what we should call the capital of the People's Republic of China.

There were several lengthy discussions, mostly on the talk-page of the list of communes. I have no objection in principle to moving Merano, and, if we do, the text here, which documents what we actually do, should change. But the place for that is WP:RM and Talk:Merano, not here. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:01, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Support --PhJ (talk) 21:46, 15 February 2009 (UTC) - The name in the language of the majority should be used.

Support The whole thing is causing enough confusion already, we need consistency. Delete this passage. Gryffindor (talk) 00:08, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

• We have consistency. What we do not need is the conflict between German and Italian nationalism. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 00:23, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Support According to the long-standing convention on municipality names in the province, which allows at least for relatively stable solutions, the article name should be Meran. Gun Powder Ma (talk) 01:16, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

A misstatement of this convention: it has always preferred English usage to majority names, because WP:RM has done so. Accordingly, the exceptional case of Merano has always been part of the section on the South Tyrol; I helped write that part of the convention. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:06, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

please take this to WP:RM This is not the correct venue, and the result is worthless Jasy jatere (talk) 01:06, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

No we do not have consistency obviously, otherwise this discussion would not be taken place. It is only right to have this naming convention straightened out properly with a discussion by all users interested before moving on to a motion to rename. I ask for a little bit more time to have all voices heard, change the convention (if agreed upon) and then move to the next steps. By simply voting on the RM (again), it could imply that the convention was null and void to begin with. Gryffindor (talk) 01:18, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

• Jan, your Administrative rights should have been Null and Void from the very beginning. It is with a certain satisfaction and vindication that I see you, PhJ, Noclador, all back again to try and re-germanize. Heck, change the Province of Bolzano back to South Tyrol too.  :) Icsunonove (talk) 09:58, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
• No. I see that Gryffindor still does not understand what our conventions are: a record of consensus, as it exists in practice. If Merano moves, this page will shift to reflect what we actually do. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:03, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Disambiguation for buildings and/or landmarks

I'm not sure if this NC is supposed to be applied to buildings or landmarks, but there doesn't seem to be other relevant NCs. Wikipedia:Naming conventions (architecture) is marked as historical and doesn't really answer the question either. The disambiguation pages at Empire Tower and Victory Monument reflect the lack of a standard disambiguation scheme for buildings pretty well. For example, should the Empire Tower in Bangkok be at Empire Tower (Bangkok), Empire Tower, Bangkok, Empire Tower (Thailand), or Empire Tower, Thailand? --Paul_012 ^(talk) 05:09, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

It should fit in here; there was a discussion of neighborhoods which seems to have gotten lost in the merge and which preferred Chinatown (San Francisco) when disambiguation was necessary. Analogy would suggest Empire Tower (Bangkok); after all, it is possible to have two Empire Towers in one country. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:07, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Please add </sup> to your signature. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:09, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Can we record as a convention, then, that buildings, landmarks and neighborhoods within towns/cities are normally disambiguated in the form [Name (City)]?--Kotniski (talk) 09:16, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Only if it's true; and looking at Chinatown, I see it's Chinatown, San Francisco. I would recommend that we say that neighborhoods, landmarks, and buildings are disambiguated by town, when necessary, and that using parentheses makes clearer that the town is not a customary part of the name. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:48, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Yes, a quick look around does seem to indicate that commas are more common than parentheses for these categories.--Kotniski (talk) 17:16, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

And some neighborhoods are census-designated places, like Lincroft, New Jersey (which is idiom; I doubt Chinatown, Calfornia is). We may want to leave this alone until there's a problem. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:55, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

• And we use Canarsie, Brooklyn, although it appears to be unambiguous. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 23:57, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Isn't that neighboorhoods and buildings/landmarks are not necessarily disambiguated the same way? -- User:Docu

I would prefer to finally have a convention for neighborhoods, landmarks and buildings. For example at the moment there is an annoyingly inconsistent mishmash of Financial District, San Francisco, California, Chinatown, San Francisco and The Embarcadero (San Francisco) --Joowwww (talk) 14:33, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

On the neighbourhood front, last year the Canadians decided that neighbourhoods would be disambiguated with the comma convention (as the bracket convention was felt to be more appropriately used for geophysical entities), and that they would be disambiguated with the name of the municipality (except in some circumstances where the name of the province would be used). It's at WP:CANSTYLE#Neighbourhoods/communities. --Skeezix1000 (talk) 16:42, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Unnecessary disambig?

• Conversation moved per custom to Talk:Georgina, Ontario#Page rename proposal --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 21:39, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Hi. Anyone hanging out here? The redirect page Georgina was recently redirected to Georgia, which doesn't even include the word. I've restored the original direction, but while doing this, I realized that Georgina, Ontario seems to be alone in its field. Is there any reason that Georgina, Ontario should not be moved to Georgina? --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 17:07, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Without a shadow of a doubt. There are plenty of non-redirect links from Special:PrefixIndex/Georgina.--O'DELAQUATIQUE (talk) (contributions) (e-mail) 17:48, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Presuming that "without a shadow of a doubt" means that you perceive a reason against the move, I'm not sure how that would bar moving the only article that seems to be on an entity named "Georgina" to the primary spot. There are plenty of non-redirect links from Special:PrefixIndex/Dallas, too, but the city in Texas as parked at Dallas, with a disambiguation page. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 19:12, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I won't speak to the merits of the move suggestion, except to point out to Moonriddengirl that the applicable guideline is at WP:CANSTYLE. --Skeezix1000 (talk) 19:16, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Ah, thank you! I'll go read it over. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 19:42, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

←Rather than move may discussion there, since I've already linked this from the article, I'll summarize what I've found here: "Towns (unless the town's population is akin to that of a city), villages, neighbourhoods and other smaller settlements must have unique place names to qualify for a page move." This one seems to have a unique place name; while there are many women named Georgina, there's no other article that I've seen called "Georgina" and no other place. In addition, it certainly seems to have a population akin to that a city if City#Canada is correct, as its population of 42,346 is far beyond the range given there of 5,000-10,000. It also says, "In most cases, an article is a candidate for such a page move if "City" already exists on Wikipedia as a redirect to "City, Province"." It did, from June 2004 until June 2005, when it was made into a 2-article disambig with a now-deleted pornstar article: Georgina Lempin. After that article was deleted, it was restored to a redirect, until today. Unless a disambiguation page is to be created for persons named Georgina and placed there, which would also include a listing for the place, there seems to be no reason not to move the article and plenty of reason to. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 19:58, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Typically, discussions over the implementation of WP:CANSTYLE for a particular article are done on the article's talk page, so as to involve those editors who have an interest in that article, with a note over at WP:CANBOARD. See Talk:Barrie for a relatively recent example. --Skeezix1000 (talk) 21:06, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

I suppose I have done it backwards, then. As I said, I have already left a link at the article's talk page pointing here; I did so before the first response. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 21:15, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

• I have, per custom, moved this to the article's talk page. Interested editors are invited to participate there. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 21:39, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Biel/Bienne

We seem to have an article titled Biel/Bienne, contrary to our convention that we don't use double names. Is this an aberration, or is it part of a wider set of exceptions that we need to mention in the guideline?--Kotniski (talk) 11:08, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

It's consistent with the applicable naming convention. Besides, it's the city's official name. -- User:Docu

Long Island Counties

Should Long Island Counties be renamed to Long Island counties or (my preference) Counties of Long Island? ~EdGl (talk) 22:02, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

I'd rename it to a wiktionary article, myself. Does it have any encyclopedic potential? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:11, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Isn't this article better off as a section of the Long Island article? I don't see the added value of a separate article. Markussep ^Talk 19:22, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

You mean like Long Island contains four counties, two of which (Queens and Kings) are boroughs of New York City, and two of which (Nassau and Suffolk) are mainly suburban. (from the lead)? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:41, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Sort of ;-) It's not much more than a (very short) list of counties on Long Island, I wonder what content could be in the article that wouldn't be more suitable in the Long Island article. Markussep ^Talk 21:51, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Redirected. If we need the article, it should probably be at Long Island counties, since it's not a proper name. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:08, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Order of names in title

In order to preserve neutrality of presentation, I suggest that we add a new section, /* Order of names in title */, that says in essence: Where multiple geographic names occur in a title, they should be placed in alphabetical order absent a compelling reason for another order. Examples Andorra–Liechtenstein relations; Otters of the Amazon and Orinoco deltas. This would be similar to the order of countries in lists, alphabetical in order to preserve as NPOV a presentation as possible. --Bejnar (talk) 18:44, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

• Is there any disagreement? If not, I will go ahead and add it. --Bejnar (talk) 03:51, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Mountains, rivers, lakes

We need to determine at least a few basic rules/methods for how to call/disambiguate these landforms. The guidance at the three project pages we link to at the moment seems rather tentative (and sometimes vague). Any suggestions for how to address this?--Kotniski (talk) 09:51, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

what would be the purpose of these rules/methods? Depeding on the purpose, solutions might vary. Jasy jatere (talk) 10:32, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Well yes, there's no reason to impose just one solution. But since we go into so much detail about names for cities and towns, it seems inconsistent and confusing to shunt people off to WikiProject pages if they want to find out about naming for physical features.--Kotniski (talk) 10:38, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

If there is a wikiproject which has NCs for that, those should be listed here. If none such wikiproject exists, my guess would be that it is not a problem, and that we should not invent rules for problems which do not exist. Jasy jatere (talk) 10:57, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

There are 3 projects whose conventions we currently link to. However conventions on project pages may not have clear consensus, and they are not all written in very clear guideline-like language. So it would be better to get at least the main points here. (The problems do exist; I've wondered myself on a few occasions how to name articles on rivers and lakes, and I've seen long discussions about the naming of mountains.)--Kotniski (talk) 11:12, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

There has been discussion about the naming rules for rivers in the past, mainly about using brackets, commas and the word "river". Judging from a quick check of a few categories of rivers by country, I think nearly all rivers follow the rules under Wikipedia:WikiProject Rivers#Naming. Local usage (the UK uses "River X", outside the UK "X" or "X River" is more common) is followed. Markussep ^Talk 11:40, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

For lakes, the convention is at WP:LAKES#Naming. Despite the wording, it's regularly monitored and applied for all lakes except those in New Zealand. -- User:Docu

And what happens in New Zealand? --Kotniski (talk) 16:56, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

For NZ, there was WT:NC (NZ)#Lakes_disambiguation. -- User:Docu

Am I right that the following general rules apply in all three cases?

1. Disambiguators always go in parentheses, not after commas
2. If a feature (in a non-English-speaking place) has no established English name, then use the bare name, or, if convenient for disambiguation: X Lake, Y River, Mount Z

--Kotniski (talk) 17:01, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

I suppose you're right about the disambiguators. I'm not sure whether Lake X or X Lake is the preferred option (and whether there should be a general rule), e.g. Lake Baikal and Valdai Lake, both in Russia. Markussep ^Talk 17:08, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

For lakes, if there is no established English name, generally, just the available name of the feature is used. No original creations are being used.

There are cases where the name of the lake is also used for a settlement at the lake and both are described in the same article. In this case, sometimes the usual convention for populated places in the country is being used, e.g. Sandy Lake, Louisiana. As articles grows longer, these are eventually split in two pages, the lake using "Sandy Lake (Louisiana)", the settlement "Sandy Lake, Louisiana". Obviously, it could also be the other way round, e.g. Scott Lake (Washington).

Anyways, as the current way of working out things seems to work quite well, I would avoid including lakes in a new convention. -- User:Docu

But we could include lakes in a statement something like "for natural features such as rivers, lakes and mountains, any disambiguating tag is placed in parentheses rather than after a comma, except where national conventions provide otherwise (as for New Zealand)"? --Kotniski (talk) 07:44, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure if we should generalize the NZ implementation (or rather its absence). A more general statement could do, e.g. "For natural features such as rivers, lakes and mountains, any disambiguating tag is generally placed in parentheses rather than after a comma. For full details, please see the feature specific guidelines.". -- User:Docu

I've added what I think is appropriate text along these lines, and a bit more detail about disambiguation in general.--Kotniski (talk) 13:56, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

I detailed it a bit further. It looks good to me now. -- User:Docu

Just revive: Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(landforms) TopoCode2009 (talk) 06:01, 16 March 2009 (UTC)