User talk:Howard C. Berkowitz/Archive 3: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 09:42, 11 February 2024

Did you mean to do that?

I missed this the first time because I usually look at all the changes at the same time.. then I saw that you deleted something.. did you mean to do that? I was going to respond, but thought maybe you changed your mind or something. D. Matt Innis 23:48, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Didn't mean to delete; now trying to figure out how to restore it. Howard C. Berkowitz 23:57, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Do you like Ike?

How do you feel about the Dwight D. Eisenhower article from a military standpoint? Is it ready for approval? If so, could you nominate it? Then I'll get some people from other applicable workgroups to join in. --Joe Quick 16:33, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

It's not ready. The WWII is better than Cold War; the Cold War has a lot of ideological baggage. It's fixable, but I need references and I'd like to get some Afghanistan things in better order -- to say nothing of some Vietnam material that's long been close to approval. Howard C. Berkowitz 16:38, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

RIM-2 Terrier

I have made a copy of your article in my draft space, with the minor modification of using the convert template instead of writing out the conversion. I have set the values to display what you had written, however if you want a more precise conversion simply change {{convert|12|km|feet|-4}} to display as {{convert|12|km|feet|2}} and it will display out to the second decimal.

If you like it this way, simply copy the draft into the article space. I have not touched anything other than the conversions.Drew R. Smith 20:26, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

DNS

Hi, Howard, did you see my last remark? Peter Schmitt 14:32, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Oh, I should have guessed this ... Peter Schmitt 14:51, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Howard, we need some feedback

Howard, please look at This thread in the forums. We need some feedback in that thread. Milton Beychok 06:37, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

Air Force

Howard, Air Force is in state of moving, did you forget it?--Paul Wormer 15:20, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Dutch air force

"Koninklijke Luchtmacht nu‎" means literally "Royal Air Force now" (nu = now). Why do you have the now? --Paul Wormer 15:39, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Because I don't speak Dutch and that's the translation given by my reference! We should, by all means, change it. Howard C. Berkowitz 15:43, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Kop or sysop needed to format AOTW

Hi Howard, can you please apply these changes to Ancient Celtic music and then set back CZ:Article of the Week to this version? Thanks! --Daniel Mietchen 20:53, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Note that the second paragraph had a "<" removed, and the third one a " " added before the final onlyinclude. --Daniel Mietchen 20:56, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

One more thing: This transcluded version starts with the article title, but this would not be needed in the approved page, as it already has that title. --Daniel Mietchen 21:04, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Now changed it such that you can simply copy the whole User:Daniel_Mietchen/Sandbox/AOTW into Ancient Celtic music. --Daniel Mietchen 22:44, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Underground

'subway' is the American term, it sees a little usage here too but 'underground' or 'metro' is more common, mainly because 'subway' over here refers to a pedestrian underpass. 'Metro' is the best general term I think, mainly because it's used worldwide and it doesn't restrict to systems with underground running. I put District Line in the Engineering workgroup, there needs to be a transport one though! Tom F Walker 21:42, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Internet protocol

Howard, you are answering so quickly that I suspect that you did not notice that a few days ago I put two questions/remarks on Talk:Internet Protocol. Furthermore, you should check if my edits are ok. Peter Schmitt 00:35, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

At Anycasting you have reacted immediately. May I ask what's the matter with Internet Protocol? Peter Schmitt 19:54, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, I didn't know anything was outstanding. I'll check it soon; I'm trying to finish some things with books I have to return to the library this evening. Howard C. Berkowitz 20:00, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

What title should I use?

Howard, I am writing an article on the U.S.'s Clean Air Act. That is its legal name, Clean Air Act. But some other countries also have Clean Air Acts. So how should I title the article on the U.S.'s Clean Air Act? At the moment, I am leaning toward "Clean Air Act (United States)".

What would you suggest? Milton Beychok 02:49, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

I'd use Clean Air Act (U.S.). Howard C. Berkowitz 04:11, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

File transfer vs FTP

I answered you over on my talk page (I know it's easy to lose track when you edit someone else's talk page... a shortcoming of talk pages in my opinion) -Eric M Gearhart 14:10, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Voting for Domain Name System nominee for Article of the Week

Howard, I am not sure that it is kosher for you to change Peter Schmitt's vote from supporter to specialist supporter. I would feel more comfortable about it if you asked him to confirm that change either on your Talk page or my Talk page. Regards, Milton Beychok 19:46, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

I accidently saw this and added a remark at User talk:Milton Beychok#Specialist supporter-- Peter Schmitt 20:21, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

pointer

Howard, I left a response on my talk page to your entry. I explain there why it took me so long to respond. Dan Nessett 15:16, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Internment

In light of emerging news about the Tamils, I'm considering starting an article on internment as a general practice. The topic covers military, politics, and sociology, so we definitely have enough editors to do a three-editor approval if some of them are involved. Care to join me? I'll probably download some reference materials today and tomorrow and get started some time this week.

P.S. I also intend to get back to the interrogation article and approvals in the next few days. Having a house guest got me distracted... --Joe Quick 20:22, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Is internment a subset of extrajudicial detention? I would argue it mostly is; there are some "legal but nonjudicial" forms of internment specified by international law. I'd consider both detention of enemy aliens (and diplomats temporarily) in a declared war, and then population things such as the Japanese, both to be internment. Note that I exclude things that are intended to be harsh, such as the gulags and concentration camps from internment.

You weren't interrogating the house guest, were you?

I may be doing some short classes on interrogation and intelligence soon, a one-hour about the US probably approved this week, but perhaps a 4-8 week adult education course. Howard C. Berkowitz 20:31, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I'd say it's mostly a subset of extrajudicial detention. I can't think of any historical examples that weren't extrajudicial, but I don't think that part is actually intrinsic to the idea or practice of internment though. It doesn't take much of a stretch to imagine a legal system making allowances for the internment of certain categories of people. Some of the actions taken against Native Americans in U.S. history might count. I guess we'll find answers as we go along. --Joe Quick 03:13, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Never mind about internment. The term really isn't defined well enough to create a useful article. I was finally convinced when I searched the text of the Geneva Convention for uses of the word. Oh well. I'll have to think of something else. --Joe Quick 03:02, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Not Geneva Conventions primarily; see [1]; Vienna Conventions on diplomatic practice and International Humanitarian Law. I think you will find it mentioned in the GC Additional Protocols. Howard C. Berkowitz 03:17, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Oh, wow! I felt like I was getting some general impressions but nothing specific enough to use as a basis for an article. That document positively affirms those broad themes though. Thanks! I find it fittingly humorous that, after I spent all that time coming to the conclusion that the details are vague at best, there's a line that reads, "The Fourth Geneva Convention makes it explicitly clear that internment..." Yeah right! --Joe Quick 13:50, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

You are, as I recall, in the US? A few years ago, it became much more complex to have a prescription filled due to new HIPAA regulations. The act making these changes, and I am not joking, was the "HIPAA Adminstrative Simplification Act." Howard C. Berkowitz 14:15, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

transplantation

Is there a reason all of those articles need to be titled Transplantation, heterologous‎ and Transplantation, isogeneic‎ and so forth rather than Heterologous transplantation and Isogenic transplantation? If it is for keeping them together in lists, that can be done using the abc field in the metadata and leaving the title as the actual term. --Joe Quick 16:10, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

The rationale is that those are the exact indexing terms used by the National Library of Medicine in Medical Subject Headings. I certainly don't mind redirecting in non-inverse order, and indeed am doing so for synonyms such as xenotransplantation, but I do believe that when there is an authoritative reference for a term, that should be the article name. As long as there are redirects, it shouldn't be a problem for the reader. Howard C. Berkowitz 16:16, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

But that's an index. We have the abc field so that in our index-equivalents we can alphabetize them just the same. But regular old article titles aren't part of an index. --Joe Quick 03:32, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

And again, the lede sentence says "heterologous transplantation". There's a redirect to that term. Yes, there may be indexing -- NLM isn't the only such source -- but I am emphatically in favor of the main article title using an authoritative name when one exists. The fact that the title of the article is something odd, as long as users can get to it and search engines can find it, doesn't hurt usability in the least. Indeed, it may help, because the authoritative term should be the search string in things like MEDLINE. Howard C. Berkowitz 14:42, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

I have a hard time believing that those are really the "authoritative terms". They might be the authoritative terms after having been adjusted to be more easily found in an index. But I'm not going to argue because it isn't worth it. --Joe Quick 19:25, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Joe, I spent a number of years working at the Library of Congress, and indeed with NLM. As a chemist, I worked with the sometimes obscure nomenclature of the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry.

You may be confusing "authoritative name" with "user-friendly name". They aren't the same. Further, as long as there is a user-friendly way a search engine can find a concept, why is it so important that the article title be user-friendly rather than authoritative? I guess I don't know why you are making an issue of this — it's a fairly basic concept in library science. From a human factors standpoint, the issue is having multiple names available. Howard C. Berkowitz 19:47, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Military Editor Qualifications

Howard, do you have any idea what would qualify someone to be a Military Group editor? We have an applicant with 6 years military experience, but I have no idea what criteria to use for thie particular group. David E. Volk 23:18, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

No simple answer. I could look at the background. For soldiers, look for command, training, or staff experience. For contractors/civil servants, look for things that indicate review or decisionmaking. Where things really get challenging is the avocational expert, soldier or civilian: I know medieval reenactors who are software engineers that know the Battle of Hastings, or Viking raiding, as well as people of the time. The best historian of the Byzantine Empire that I know is an Army Engineer sergeant. Remember, Tom Clancy was an insurance agent. Howard C. Berkowitz 23:43, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Are you okay with my nominating Chester Nimitz for New Draft of the Week?

Let me know as soon as possible ... or sooner. Milton Beychok 03:52, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Nimitz is fine, although I really should make it a priority to do some updates to it. I was going to get E.B. Potter's biography on interlibrary loan, but it's mostly available on Google. There are a bunch of other updates I can make, and look quickly for sourcing. Howard C. Berkowitz 04:11, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

It has been nominated. If you would like to add your vote as a supporter, please do so. Milton Beychok 07:52, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Block cipher

I've completed my move & am becoming active again. I've created AES competition, but more things mentioned in last couple of sections of Talk:Block_cipher need doing, and I'd like editor input first.

Two main questions, quoting talk page:

It is becoming clear we need a catalog listing many block ciphers, perhaps starting with WP's list. I'm not sure how to create that; I could do it with an HTML table but there may be a way that is more wiki-ish or easier. Suggestions? Volunteers?

What it the right format for article names? Blowfish cipher? Blowfish block cipher? Blowfish (cryptography)? Blowfish (cipher)?

The first one is not urgent; we can do that when we get to it, though likely it should be done before approval. The second is urgent; I want to create articles, but am not certain what to call them. "Blowfish (cipher)" would be my first choice, but I do not feel strongly about it. Sandy Harris 05:26, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I would say blowfish (cipher). And it can always be moved if it turns out to be the wrong choice.Drew R. Smith 06:05, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Welcome back. How's the new area?

Catalogs confuse me as well, especially when they are more than a simple list; see Intelligence interrogation, U.S., George W. Bush Administration/Catalog. Daniel or Milton might be able to advise; we really need some style guides.

Yes, I think Blowfish [minimal name] (word), where word preferably is a main article title. Right now, we have (block cipher), but if we have enough (cipher) articles, I think I'd prefer mildly, the more general if there is a (cipher) article.

Increasingly, I've started disambiguating things both when the basic word is ambiguous (e.g., Arrow (missile), or when it's cryptic and doesn't suggest anything (e.g., Vympel R-33 (missile)). I may be rationalizing, but I haven't put a (encryptor) on KG-34 because it follows the TSEC- system, and it will always be written TSEC/KG-34. Howard C. Berkowitz 15:18, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I'd say (cipher) or (cryptography). Regarding catalogs: In this case a simple list of ciphers (classified according type, if feasable) is sufficient (similar to a Related articles subpage), maybe with the year it has been developed. Using the {{r}} template only if the definitions are reasonably different which they probably will not be. Peter Schmitt 16:56, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

That is done. Both block cipher and AES competition may now be close to approvable, and there are a whole lot of new (short, often incomplete) articles on specific ciphers or groups like CAST, RC*, SAFER, LOKI. Sandy Harris 01:24, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

In the process, Ive created at least a dozen small articles for individual block ciphers: Tiny Encryption Algorithm, Square (cipher), etc. Most of these do not yet have subpages. What categories should they get? Obviously "computer", probably "mathematics", perhaps "military". I could just guess and/or mark them all for category check, but it seems better to ask.

Should they have a "main" tag? Cryptography? Block cipher? I'd say that's unnecessary since they all start with "<name> is a block cipher..." anyway. What do you think & is there a policy? Sandy Harris 07:28, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

linking acronyms

Just had a glance over cruiser. Should we be linking acronyms like "HMAS" and "DKM"? I figured out HMAS right away but had trouble with DKM. I presume the links would point to articles like Australian navy and Bundesmarine. Just a thought, but I didn't want to actually create the links without asking. --Joe Quick 23:23, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

I've taken a first shot, but it's a little tricky. You'll see that I linked the acronym from a graphics caption, not a ship name, because the prefix is part of the ship name. We have, therefore, articles USS and USS Vincennes (CG-49). Germany used SMS and DKM, although I'm not sure that they use a prefix these days. DKM is even stranger since one usually referred to the WWII command as OKM. Howard C. Berkowitz 23:46, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

"SMS" should be "Seiner Majestät Schiff". Peter Schmitt 00:09, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, Howard, "Seine Majestäts Schiff" is still not correct. Peter Schmitt 00:24, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Peter, my German is non-native and mostly forgotten. Would you correct it, please? Howard C. Berkowitz 00:36, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Sure, I just did not want to interfere while you were working on it (and you know better where you used this phrase). Therefore I preferred to leave a message. You got it right in the definition, but not when moving the page. Peter Schmitt 10:04, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Having just looked over the Battle of Coronel), I do not think linking ship nationality prefixes (or whatever they are called) is a good idea. It's just too much linking and gets in the way of authoring. If a person is interested in what SMS means, they can (presumably) backlink through the SMS Scharnhorst page, etc. And as Howard pointed out above, the prefix is part of the ship's name. Russell D. Jones 12:51, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Well, that's rather why I wrote Battle of Coronel -- to explore what would happen. There's no question it is awkward for authoring. The prefix is part of the name. When we speak of "Mr. Smith", we don't link "Mr.", although I believe we do have an article somewhere that explains at least "miss" and "Mrs."

It is practical and useful to have links for such thing as ADM and LTG, but those aren't parts of names, but rather they are titles. Howard C. Berkowitz 14:51, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Grand Trunk Railway

Howard, I just nominated this one for approval. Please look it over. It's in the engineering workgroup. (I don't know why). Russell D. Jones 20:55, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

We've generally put transportation into Engineering. Howard C. Berkowitz 20:59, 4 August 2009 (UTC)

Kamehameha I

In my opinion, Kamehameha I is as close to being "complete" as it can be. I think I have covered all major aspects of his life. I am asking you four; Joe Quick (as approvals manager), Roger Lohmann (as a history and politics editor), Russell Jones (as a history editor), and Howard Berkowitz (as a military editor), to look over the article and suggest any changes you think neccessary. Between the five of us, I don't see why we can't get this article improved. Thanks for your time. Drew R. Smith 09:49, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Returning to Vietnam

Well, here's one site that identified the picture I think we were thinking about. Russell D. Jones 01:48, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Right; that's the most common one, which is not from the embassy. Note that it's a UH-1 helicopter, while the Embassy evacuation used much larger CH-53's. Howard C. Berkowitz 01:50, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Please comment on Earth's atmosphere

Howard, Earth's atmosphere is my first venture outside my field of expertise. I would appreciate any comments you may offer. Milton Beychok 19:08, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Articles on books...

I'd like to write an article on a book I recently read, The Age of Ra by James Lovegrove, and I wanted to take the time to ask a couple people about the mechanics of articles about books.

Are plot summaries ok?
Are lists of Characters ok, main characters or otherwise?
Is it ok to take a picture of the front cover to use as a picture for the article?
Is it ok to include an average retail price?

and finally

If included, should any of these things be put on a subpage?

Thanks Howard - Drew R. Smith 05:09, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

I've primarily been doing articles on nonfiction books, but on subjects where there is considerable reason to link to articles, include reviews, etc. See The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order, The End of History and the Last Man, etc. Where I've done fiction, it's been part of a series such as Horatio Hornblower or Honor Harrington. Sounds like you might have other sorts of books in mind, but take what you like. Howard C. Berkowitz 05:59, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

History of Technology Subgroup

I wonder if the engineering and history folks couldn't get together on this? Russell D. Jones 17:33, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Makes sense. I might consider adding health sciences as well, as distinct from the pure sciences, because there are definitely technologies in healthcare. Military is also a possibility, depending on how one defines technology -- does it include organization? I might also argue that any military technology has to be engineered. Howard C. Berkowitz 18:25, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

See this. You'd pipe engineering after history. Russell D. Jones 20:14, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Welcome

Hi Howard,

A bit late in getting back to you but thanks for the welcome! I made my account quite a while ago but only now am I starting to get back to Citizendium. I'm really working on a bunch of different topics at the moment to help build the Citizendium database and draw new people to the site. The vibe I am getting from the overall atmosphere of the forums and recent events is "this is the big one", the year that proves if Citizendium can compete if you will. If that is indeed the case, I will gladly do my part to show it can! --Mehar Gill 03:12, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Natural number/Related Articles

Howard, you and Daniel have edited Natural number/Related Articles. Since our views on what should be included seem to differ I would like to discuss what should and what should not be included to make the list useful. See this section of the talk page. Peter Schmitt 14:06, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

US states' RA pages

Okay, I can do that. I'm going to finish up the states right now and the remaining (31 to go) will use subheads. When I sweep through the states next, I will switch the others. Still, not sure why anyone would wish to link to the subheads. James F. Perry 18:02, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Names of cities

I'm almost done adding the "principal cities" to the Related Articles pages for all 50 U.S. states. I will move all of those city articles whose names do not conform to CZ Naming Conventions (proper form: Anchorage, Alaska). This means moving Los Angeles, for example (the article, not the city).

While doing the listings, I re-formatted those pages where necessary (changing bolding to subheads).

In case you're curious, I got the cities out of a road atlas, just using all those for which the atlas had inserts. There should be about 275 total, including almost all U.S. cities with population in excess of 100,000. Plus I made sure that all state capitals were included, and a very few others (Alamogordo, New Mexico comes to mind).

James F. Perry 18:33, 2 September 2009 (UTC)

State articles (standard outline)

I have posted an outline on the South Dakota page intended to be used as a type of template for the writing of detailed articles on each of the U.S. states:

http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/South_Dakota

Before copying it to all the other states' pages (or their associated talk pages), I would like to know if you have any comments or suggestions. If so, please add them to the South Dakota talk page.

James F. Perry 01:53, 4 September 2009 (UTC)

CDC Bioterrorism Agents-Disease list

Hi Howard, I think this list would fit best into a Catalogs subpage, but I have no idea what the most suitable article would be. Can you please take a look and rename accordingly? Thanks! --Daniel Mietchen 11:15, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

If anything, Daniel, it should be renamed to "List", because that is the actual name of the document: "CDC Bioterrorism Agents-Disease List". It's not a CZ List/Catalog I created on my own. Is there a good way to qualify this, such as "Official List"? Howard C. Berkowitz 13:07, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

We do not keep lists in the main namespace unless on Catalogs subpages, so I moved this one around a bit, to finally land at CZ:List of bioterrorism agents and diseases (CDC). --Daniel Mietchen 13:52, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

I really would like this moved back. It is not a "list" in the conventional CZ sense, as it is accompanied by descriptions of categorizations of the organisms and is not a catalog. As a Military Workgroup Editor, I rule that it is the name of a document with official status in biological warfare, and the fact that the name contains the word "list" does not move it out of mainspace. There are a number of "lists" of export-controlled items, such as the Militarily Controlled Technologies List, where the actual item-by-item list is a relatively small part of the document, just as are the "schedules" in the Chemical Warfare Convention. There are, incidentally, a large number of links to this document, both as the article itself and its definition page in R-templates.Howard C. Berkowitz 14:00, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

Let's collaborate on generating a proposal

Howard,

We probably have done about as much as possible running the idea of involving an external organization with a proposed internet workgroup on the forum. I think we should now put our heads together and come up with some details. I will get some organization to the pages on the wishlist item CZ:Wishlist and let you know when that is done. In the meantime, maybe we can think about the tasks involved in getting a relationship going. What do you think? Dan Nessett 21:50, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

OK, I have added some pages where we can do our work. Our wishlist item is the fifth one down, currently the last entry. Take a look at the pages and edit them according to your taste. I will start working on the proposal tomorrow morning by adding some ideas to the Establish Relationship with External Organization page. If you want to get a headstart, go for it. Dan Nessett 22:27, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

Al-Shabab (insurgency)

I didn't want to distract the conversation you started in the forums, but you mentioned starting an article about Al Shabab. I've seen some other news coverage about them recently, on something or other that was relatively important but which I can't recall. Google news might be a good place to start if you have any plans for expanding the article. It always seems like a good idea (though frequently an impractical one) to try to stay a little ahead of what the public is likely to be looking up. Unfortunately, all I know is that Al Shabab seems to be a pretty big player in Somali politics, as it seems to control rather a lot of territory.--Joe Quick 15:24, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Got it. It was an attack on an African Union base at the end of August. Incidentally, the NY Times, though as a news outlet it's not as inherently reliable as some other sources might be, has a pretty good summary of just what the organization is about. --Joe Quick 15:38, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Sorry for the delayed response; I had to work until much later than usual yesterday. I don't think the Somalia article is really ready to be featured as an article of the week yet: it doesn't contain any information about the geography, natural resources, or cultures of the country yet. The material about wars and conflict is good, but if we feature it with only that material, I'm afraid we'd be sending a pretty negative message about Somalia. I wish I knew enough to expand those other sections. The al-Shabab (insurgency) article is an admirable start, and very pertinent to current events, so I'm going to nominate it for NDOTW. --Joe Quick 13:38, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Dunno how to encourage collaboration on Somalia short of actually asking people. I noticed there isn't yet a plan for the write-a-thon theme next month so I suggested "continents." I guess the idea for "Big Collaborations" never really went anywhere, though we could try to revive it... --Joe Quick 17:42, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

I periodically update this, but it isn't among my highest priorities. Is anyone reading it? Would anyone like to collaborate? Howard C. Berkowitz 00:16, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

Charter drafting candidacy

Hi Howard,

Thanks for accepting your nomination to be a candidate for election to the drafting committee for the Citizendium charter.

If you'd like, there is a provision in the plan that provides a place for you to compose a position statement. You are not required to do this in order to be a candidate for election to the committee, but it would be helpful to others during the voting period. Even if you don't compose a statement before the election period concludes, should you be elected it might be helpful for other members of the committee to know what you feel are the most important issues to address with the draft. You can find a red link to the page where you can write your statement here, along with instructions for doing so.

If you have any questions, just let me know. --Joe Quick 15:27, 17 September 2009 (UTC)

Please respond to my request on the talk page of the Internet article

Howard,

I have stated my views on rolling back the Internet article to the old text. You decided to do this (perhaps before reading my comments on the Internet talk page). I don't want to get into an edit war with you, so would you take the time to respond to my comments? Thanks. Dan Nessett 04:58, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

Clean-up

Howard, re history of computers: I believe the following page needs some work: List_of_seminal_concepts_in_computer_science --Paul Wormer 15:25, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

On this, I'm not even sure where to start or what we want to do. It seems to me more like a list of work items for the computers workgroup than an actual article. Howard C. Berkowitz 17:12, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

Another page needing attention is RF_electronics. You did some work on it. --Paul Wormer 17:07, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

Actually, this came from User: Sekhar Talluri, as part of a series of edits he made in May. My edits were to try to bring it into more conformity with radio. If he isn't actively working on the topic, perhaps the better fix is to find out where this text was referenced, and see what is specific to his instrumentation articles and what can be a more general part of the radio article.

If it's about MRI, I really would like a guide to that black art. I think I understand CT and SPECT, but how the image gets formed in MRI always has mystified me. Howard C. Berkowitz 17:12, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

Natural gas

Thanks for your comments on Natural gas. I have implemented your suggestion that I replace the word "natural gas" with the word "methane' wherever it is appropriate. Milton Beychok 06:38, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

speech recognition

Howard, do you know enough about Speech Recognition to feel comfortable approving it as a Computers Editor? It looks like a bunch of people have put in quite a lot of work. I only skimmed quickly but it looks like good work, too. At minimum, we need to move the article to a lowercase title before we approve, but that might be just about all.
Thanks,
Joe (Approvals Manager) 05:06, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

Is this reference pertinent to your article on Agent Orange?

"A Database on Dioxin and Furan Emissions from Municipal Incinerators", M.R. Beychok (1987), Atmospheric Environment", Volume 21, Number 1, pp.29-36

(I happen to know the author fairly well) Milton Beychok 07:05, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

Hi, Howard. Can you use the above reference or not? Let me know. Milton Beychok 20:48, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

Nope, that article was written about 23 years ago and people were just beginning to wake up to the idea that dioxin and furan emission regulations were needed. The U.S. EPA's regulations had not been promulgated as yet. The method's for analyzing dioxins and furan emissions in the parts per trillion range didn't really exist as yet. My paper was one of the first that tried to provide a data base from which a commonly-accepted characterization of those emissions might be evolved. I just thought it might be of interest in your Agent Orange viewpoint from a historical viewpoint. I no longer have a copy . If you wanted to read it, it would require a visit to a library with Atmospheric Environment copies dating back to the 1980s. Milton Beychok 00:05, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

The Forgotten Soldier

Hi, Howard, I've done a little cleaning up here and subpaging etc., but it could use some more and it clearly falls under your editorship. It appears to be mostly derived from the WP article but is almost entirely paraphrased so it *probably* doesn't need the WP checkbox, but that is your decision, I would say. Thanks. Hayford Peirce 17:41, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Hey Howard, thanks for helping out. I started reading the book a few days ago and was completely amazed at how good it is. The Wikipedia article does it no justice so I thought I should create one on Citizendium. I will be adding to it overtime, hopefully it can become a approved article before the end of the month.

Thank you for those recommendations, I will have to put it on list, I don't want to take on too many articles at one time so I will have to finish the ones I have already started work on before moving on with more.

Thanks again! --Mehar Gill 18:11, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Bernie Schriever

What about at least a stub about him? A big new important book about him has just come out? Hayford Peirce 04:52, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

The Air Force general? Howard C. Berkowitz 05:13, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Yup, first page review of the book in the Sunday NYT book section -- says he was a *very* very important man that most people have now forgotten. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/04/books/review/Beschloss-t.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=Bernard%20Schriever&st=cse Hayford Peirce 18:17, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

OK. Essentially father of the US ICBM program. There are three redlinks to Schriever Air Force Base.

I'd be willing to review an article on him, but, for my own article creation, I'm tending to focus on things that help give background for the current world situation, military force development, etc. Howard C. Berkowitz 19:49, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Term/Title for industry

Howard, look at my latest response to you on Talk:Petroleum crude oil. Milton Beychok 21:37, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Anycasting

Howard, you mentioned Anycasting. I have not forgotten it. But there are still the two dead links. You wanted to replace them. See talk (I think they could also be deleted.)
Are you familiar with WebCite? Could/should this be used for your online links?
Peter Schmitt 20:35, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

I have just nominated Anycasting for approval. Have a look on my copy editing. Moreover, the third link in External Links is broken. You will have to replace or delete it. What about WebCite? Peter Schmitt 23:33, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

If you also don't know WebCite this can wait until we find someone who knows more about it. Peter Schmitt 00:32, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Howard, you are of course busy with the charter. But perhaps you can spare a little time and look at User talk:David MacQuigg#Anycasting. Peter Schmitt 23:52, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Barbeque & Cancer

Perhaps a section on the barbeque-induced production of benzo[a]pyrene and many other fine cancer-causing chemicals would kill the joy out of the lovely barbeque food people enjoy. Now that I think of it, how would a guy "name" a page for something like benzo[a]pyrene with the square brackets?? Perhaps some nowiki tags in the name of the article? David E. Volk 20:06, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

%5D and %5B? Howard C. Berkowitz 00:17, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Nazi military and SS ranks

That's a very informative article, I've bookmarked it, great work! What else needs to be done before it is ready for approval? --Mehar Gill 03:16, 10 October 2009 (UTC)

Oops

I've done that before! You edited the approved version. :-) D. Matt Innis 23:55, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

Where to begin?

Howard, if you were to want someone to take a look at an article and give you a little active feedback :), where would you send them first? D. Matt Innis 01:31, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Let me offer several articles that are on top of hierarchies. First, "functional":

And then subject areas:

Thanks! Howard C. Berkowitz 01:38, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

I started on Interrogation. Lots of good information there! I like the real stuff (like how they could tell what base the pictures were taken from:). I guess you can't have too much of that, but it did make it more interesting. I've been checking resources, too, and so far everything looks good. I started making remarks on the talk page ( I saw you handled the Reid technique), but then decided that most were just some minor re-wording to make it clearer because i, as a lay person, was not familiar with a term and had to read it a couple times. I don't think I changed the meaning of much, but if I did, do revert it. I'll continue again tomorrow! FOr now, I'm gonna get some shut-eye! D. Matt Innis 03:07, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Domain name system

Howard, if you find time, could you have a look at DNS. Moreover, perhaps you should also review the article once more (and also check my copy edits). Peter Schmitt 23:28, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Just a reminder. And what is your opinion on the status of Anycasting/Draft? Peter Schmitt 13:17, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

phytotherapy

Howard, I have no imediate plans to expand phytotherapy but may work on interlinking it with my current work today in the future. David E. Volk 19:23, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Very cool and user-friendly way to handle footnotes in web publications

...said Stephen Ewen (talk)

Interesting, though I do not know how to change text colour on mouse over. --Daniel Mietchen 11:19, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

Howard Katz Berkowitz?

Did you see the Deletion log? Is this an alter-ego, an impersonator, an admirer or a long-lost brother? Heh. –Tom Morris 18:44, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Presumably, Hayford's alter ego. If and when my feline associates register, they will be more subtle about it. Howard C. Berkowitz 18:48, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Howard's katz, or someone, will write up a Forum message about this one of these days. Hayford Peirce 19:19, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

Before I forget..

Take a look at Talk:U._S._intelligence_activities_in_Guatemala. Chris Day 03:40, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Free statistical software

Howard, this is from the Approved errors list. It needs your input and I can do it. D. Matt Innis 18:20, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

An aside

As a little sidebar here for an EC member and guy who calls OSI "Frankenstein's Monster" (I love that one by the way)...I wanted to say that the CZ policy:

"There will be a separation of powers: enforcement officials ("constables") will not be able to make editorial decisions, and editors will not have the ability to enforce their own decisions, though they will be able to make recommendations. "

Seems to me to be working quite well for me here...with a few isolated exceptions.--David Yamakuchi 20:48, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Wow Howard

Great job on "Criticism of US foreign policy" -- you and Chris know what you're doing. Mucho impressivito -- (my Spanish) for I'm impressed.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 01:34, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

NIST Logo

Hi, Howard. No need for the screen shot. The problem was that on different pages of the NIST website, the stylized NIST was in different colors: white (against blue or black or multi-colored background), blue (against white background), dark blue (against white background) and black (against white background) ... six choices in all. I finally selected the one I liked best (dark blue against white background) ... and if NIST answers my email inquiry with a different choice, I can always change.

The point I was trying to make on the forum was that, for some articles, it takes an excessive amount of work to find an appropriate illustration ... and for others, there simply isn't an appropriate illustration. Milton Beychok 02:29, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

That's NIST for you. At the Time Laboratory in Boulder, no two clocks showed the same time.

This is a battle I keep fighting, and losing, with publishers that pay me — they want illustrations, and preferably photos over line art, whether they make sense or not. Howard C. Berkowitz 02:32, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Would appreciate your comment at Talk:Fluid dynamics about reducing the number of sub-fields

Hi, Howard: Please take a look at Talk:Fluid dynamics and let me have your opinion (if any) about my plan to reduce the number of sub-fields listed in the current article from 43 to 13 or even less. Milton Beychok 19:46, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

Kate Walsh O&

Howard see what happens when you click the [e] link after the definition at Kate Walsh O'Beirne/Related Articles. Have you noticed this before for other titles? Chris Day 03:57, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

This is the first I've seen — perhaps it's the apostrophe in the name? I forget the HTML for apostrophe, but is it trying to do something similar to —Howard C. Berkowitz 03:59, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Now I engage my brain cells a bit I do recall seeing a problem similar to this before. See my notes at Arthur's_Seat/Approval. Hopefully I can fix it in a similar way. Chris Day 04:05, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

Actually it's not really the same problem i was trying to solve back then. It's possible that what ever that apostrophe is cannot be used. Thinking more, Aleta had a similar problem on a page recently too (see User_talk:Aleta_Curry#Who.27s_on_First.3F and User_talk:Aleta_Curry#Somebody_call_Houston.2C_.27cause_we.27ve_got_a_problem.21). I'll let you know when I figure it out. Chris Day 04:09, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

I wait your guidance until you have a general solution. Perhaps rather than the ' mark, the special HTML symbol, ' or whatever it may be, must be used. Howard C. Berkowitz 15:05, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

It's not a trivial problem, I'll let you know when I have a solution. At present I could fix the problem but then there could be know on problems. I'll probably create a test area rather than risk messing up the real subpages template. Dan's mirror wiki might come in handy. Chris Day 14:18, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

Article

Hi Howard please see User talk:Thomas Wright Sulcer/sandbox7 -- please feel free to fix it up. I worked on the wikilinks; what I'm wondering about is that many times REDIRECTs and such would help us by getting more of our articles interlinked. I'm wondering whether things like capitalization can screw up a wikilink, so that Internet Service Provider may be seen differently by a crawler than Internet service provider.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 14:58, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

We should be using redirects for obviously similar names. Especially since it stops the replication of content here too. Chris Day 15:01, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

Cloud computing

Howard would you like my help here on copyediting this article? I wouldn't change the information much but try to make it flow better. If so, ask me.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 12:06, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

Sure. I was going to do a bit more cleanup this morning, before introducing some new material.

Feel free to fix typos and awkward grammar, but check with me on the talk page before rearranging. The best copy editor I ever had for my books got very good in spotting a bad habit of mine: she'd tell me there was no clean flow from A to B, and I'd realize that happened as a result of cutting and pasting --- "B" was really "D", and "C" had been left out. Just finding out there's an apparent flow problem is what I really need -- and I need it in lots of articles. Howard C. Berkowitz 14:45, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

OK, so typos and awkward grammar, but if there are flow problems, alert you. Probably might work on tomorrow. Right now I'm writing Aeneid.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 15:25, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

I added a new subsection to the Rocket motor article.

Howard, I just added a new sub-section to the Rocket motor article entitled "Velocity of gases exiting the rocket engine nozzle exhaust" (see the article as well as the article's Talk page). If you don't like it, feel free to revise it or delete it.

By the way, for what it is worth, I think the article should be re-named (moved) to "Rocket engine". I think of a motor as being an electric motor, and rocket engines are certainly not driven by electricity. I did some Googling and NASA seems to use "rocket engine" much more often than they use "rocket motor". Milton Beychok 03:34, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

Excellent! I simply haven't learned the equation typography. Certainly, engine/motor can be redirects. Now that I think about it, I suspect that motor is more common with solid propellants and military usage.

There are electric drives that generate ion thrust — very low acceleration, for satellite stationkeeping and deep space missions. Is a "rocket" synonymous with "reaction" (in the Newtonian sense)? Howard C. Berkowitz 03:45, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

I'm glad that you are okay with the new section I added. As for re-naming the article, do I take it that are also okay with that? "Rocket motor" will then become a redirect to "rocket engine". Milton Beychok 15:14, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

Howard lets float the Terrorism prevention strategies article

If you feel it's ready. Its in one of my sandboxes. I'll try to fix some of the references so that the first reference is the FULL one (so only numbers don't appear below). --Thomas Wright Sulcer 10:49, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

Herseth Sandlin bibliography

Please check the Bibliography subpage at the Stephanie Herseth Sandlin article. Is this the kind of bibliography that is wanted for pages such as this? I think it is, but the books are not specific to the subject of the article, so I thought I'd ask. James F. Perry 00:30, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

There's no hard rule for this sort of thing, but these might be even better under South Dakota , maybe Bibliography/Politics, with a sentence or two about each -- then wikilink from the Stephanie Herseth Sandlin article. Howard C. Berkowitz 01:53, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Please consider Conventional coal-fired power plant for Approval

Howard, as a fellow Editor in the Engineering Workgroup, please look at Conventional coal-fired power plant and, if you think it worthy, nominate it for approval. Thanks much, Milton Beychok 17:56, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

In response to your question about the word "Conventional" in Conventional coal-fired power plant. Yes, there are some versions of coal-fired power plants other than the plain vanilla (conventional) version described in this article. If you will look at the section headed "Alternatives to coal-fired power plants", there is a brief mention of:

Integrated gasification combined cycle plants referred to as IGCC plants
Fluidized bed combustion plants referred to as FBC plants (and there a couple of advanced versions of this)
Oxygen firing plants that use oxygen for coal combustion rather than air, and are referred to as Oxy firing

These other versions have quite different equipment, efficiencies and air pollutant emissions. I hope this answers your question. Milton Beychok 20:12, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

I like the Conventional coal-fired power plant article but I haven't looked it over intensely and I'm not an expert, but I looks like an excellent article in my view. Terrific job!!!--Thomas Wright Sulcer 18:03, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

On another subject, Howard I'm going to be focusing on other stuff for a day or so (errands) and then I'll be back, mayB fri or so.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 18:03, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Authenticator

I think this is under your area of expertise but I am not sure, so apologies if I am asking the wrong person. Is there a standard term for (or even perhaps a CZ article describing) this type of security device? If so, does this fall under the same term/article or a different one? Thanks --Chris Key 15:51, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

What it describes is most often called a security token, although authenticator is less often used. It is part of the process of authentication, which might be just a subpart of information security now -- I need to look, and be sure we have a description of two-factor authenticator. Howard C. Berkowitz 16:28, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks Howard. I have included a couple of those terms while describing the device on the World of Warcraft#Security article. --Chris Key 16:53, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

More about approval of Conventional coal-fired power plant

Howard, both Daniel Mietchen and I have made a few very minor re-wordings in the introductory section (the lede) for more clarity. That may cause a problem when the Approval is implemented by a Constable. To avoid that problem, I would suggest that you go into the Metadata page and change the nominated version to the current version. Milton Beychok 17:56, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Just a gentle reminder that the date of the version to be approved in the Metadata page needs to be updated as mentioned just above. I am not allowed to do that ... it has to be the nominator (you). Milton Beychok 18:39, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Library of Congress Card Numbers (and ISBNs, of course)

Is there some site, or link, where I can find the old Card Numbers for first editions, say, of 1960 books of which I have 1978 reprints, which only give the more recent ISBN instead of the original Card Numbers? Thanks! Hayford Peirce 17:09, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm not Howard, but check http://catalog.loc.gov/ which seems to have what you need. --Chris Key 17:21, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

The first step is to look at the Copyright Page, and see if there's Copyright in Publishing information, which reproduces the LC Card. It will have the card number on it.

To be honest, I never really understood the purpose of the card number, even when I worked at LC, other than tracking the card while it was being created, or ordering a card. The information you want is in the MARC (Machine-Readable Cataloging) record, but I don't know if there's a public database with it. Oh, there's a MARC database at LC, but I never tried to use it from outside. Try going to http://catalog.loc.gov/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?DB=local&PAGE=First and see if typing in the ISBN gives you what you want. Howard C. Berkowitz 17:25, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Many thanks to both of you! The Card Number seems very strange to me: for instance, for The Manchurian Candidate it's simply 59-8533. That's all. 59 is the year, obviously, but 8533??? The number of novels received up to that point? I suppose that a system like that would have been OK in Thomas Jefferson's library in 1803, maybe.... Hayford Peirce 17:33, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

As I remember, it's a simple sequential number: it was the 8533rd item of work in the Cataloging Division in 1959, probably in January. When I worked there in the late seventies, about 20% of the works cataloged in the U.S. were both cataloged and put into the collection; a higher number were cataloged but not retained. Howard C. Berkowitz 17:40, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, guys -- I just found what I was looking for. It's not all that intuitive. If you see in the book, "Library of Congress Catalog Number: 64-12345", when you go to the site that you gave me and type in the title or Author you'll find a page with that book listed BUT they've added a zero or two and removed the hyphen, so that it's shown as 64001234 or 64012345. I did enough cross-checking to make sure that this is really the case. So, for A Talent for Loving, the LC page showed 61010467, which I translated into 61-10467, to match the format on the other books of that era that I own. For later books, of course, the ISBN begins to appear further down on the LC page. Glad I never worked there and tried to make sense of all that mess. Incidentally, they only show two books of mine as being in their collection, both in "rare books" or some such.... Wassa matter wid dose guys, Tommy Jefferson woulda had 'em all in *his* library! Hayford Peirce 23:28, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

(undent) You might be getting a compliment with those two. Most staff never really get to see the Rare Books Division, but, due to some shared interests, the Curator took me into the Inner Sanctum.

In general, when I was there, LC actually took about 20% of the books received through the Copyright Office into the physical collections. They, and also some cooperating libraries, prepared catalog cards for somewhat more, but I don't know the total then or now. Their principle was that they did not keep things of "ephemeral" value, which almost automatically meant anything not in hardback, not even tradeback.

You'd think Rare Books would be just that, but it was also the place where they kept materials that were especially prone to theft: I remember Playboy and the Racing Form being among them — perhaps that was your fate. For the record, the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped does produce a Braille Playboy, but it does not have the illustrations.

Try making sense of cataloging in nonroman alphabets. According to some of the librarians there, Chinese didn't have an agreed sort sequence, which is possibly why Mao Zedong, a librarian in his youth, became a revolutionary. Howard C. Berkowitz 23:39, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

@@ Line 402: / Line 402: @@
 :And then subject areas:
-*[[Afghanistan War (2001-)]]
+*[[Afghanistan War (2001-2021)]]
 *[[al-Qaeda]]
 *[[Taliban]]