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{{Appropedia:Village pump/Introduction}}
{{Appropedia:Village pump/Introduction}}


== Changing another person's project page ==
== A plan for Appropedia to go places in 2013/14 ==


One thing we haven't worked out is what limits we have to editing another person's project or organization page. A trivial example is this line from [[Usui Rice cooker]]:  
Here's a stab at a '''[[Appropedia:Strategic planning/Strategic plan 2013-14|strategic plan]]''' - what do you think? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 00:28, 19 September 2013 (PDT)


:This cooker is relevant for any place where rice is a grown and is a staple of the diet (all of Asia, as well as parts of Africa and South America).
I think its a good start. I added some comments on the Talk page there. --[[User:PatSunter|PatSunter]] ([[User talk:PatSunter|talk]]) 19:08, 12 March 2014 (PDT)


I've changed "all of Asia" to "most of Asia," to be more accurate. I don't think the author will mind, though they might think I'm pedantic. My concern is that there will be cases where more controversial changes might be made. Does the project's author have the final say, is it a question of consensus in the same way as any other wiki page, or do we need a different approach. There's a problem if the author has the final say, as the claims may be misled (cars that run on water) or even deliberately misleading (I can sell you a kit to make your car run on water). Perhaps we should go with the "same way as any other wiki page" but be open to letting the policy develop as we go? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 05:52, 16 October 2009 (UTC)
== Thanks and good luck ==
:I think the need for Appropedia to be based on facts should override any ownership objection to minor factual corrections. I'd hesitate to make wholesale edits to someone else's article. As a courtesy, one should leave a note about the change on the "owning" user's talk page, just in case he or she wasn't watching the page in question. Because it would seem the page owner takes credit for the page and would want to be aware of what he or she appears to be saying on it. Think of it like editing a book. Editors assist authors all the time, but never without the author's active awareness. The author has to approve whatever the editor changes, because the author's name goes on the book. --[[User:Teratornis|Teratornis]] 21:00, 8 January 2011 (PST)
::Belated comment: do we have a policy or guideline on user space essays? I'd like to keep article space as factual as possible, where a "fact" is something that all sane people can agree on, and confine assertions of opinion to user space essays. Users can have more freedom to express their personal opinions on user subpages, but I'd still like every opinion to be labeled as an opinion rather than implied to be a fact by asserting it with no qualification. Readers should be made aware of whether they are reading facts generally accepted as true, or just one particular side of some raging controversy. I.e., assertions should not float around independently of their context. Unfortunately, too many people tend to hold their beliefs independently of such context. That is, they just believe whatever they believe, without being mindful of the existence of other opinions about some of their beliefs. --[[User:Teratornis|Teratornis]] 12:58, 1 November 2011 (PDT)
::Interesting. To what extent do we see userspace as a free speech zone? There are limits (I think we'd all agree on no hate speech) but this is setting a much higher standard that many people just won't get, especially to start with. I prefer the kind of self-aware writing/advocacy that you're advocating, but I'm not sure if we should be enforcing it. (That's not a euphemism for "I don't think we should..." I just mean I'm not sure.) --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 18:50, 1 November 2011 (PDT)
:::I'm thinking about examples we have discussed on this very page of articles that contain prescriptive rather than descriptive content, or religious claims. As long as content is not actionable, libelous, illegal, etc. I see little harm in letting it live in user space as long as it is clearly labeled as opinion (see [[wikipedia:Template:Essay]] which I would like to port to {{SITENAME}}). Anything on {{SITENAME}} is subject to the approval of the {{SITENAME}} community and that should be an appropriate check on user space essays. The idea is not to unleash some new type of content on {{SITENAME}} but merely to relocate some of the personal opinion content that has been finding its way into article space.
:::My personal interest in this is because I would like to write some [[wikipedia:WP:SYNTHESIS|synthetic]] essays about topics such as:
:::* What would actually have to happen for the [[Keystone XL pipeline]] extension to not be built
:::* The efficacy of personal action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions - does it matter if we take the jet flight for example?
:::* Speculation about the future prospects for eco-robotics
:::* <small>(11:53, 2 November 2011 (PDT): adding another topic:)</small> What I have done to cut my personal carbon footprint, and what I have learned from the exercise about what it would actually take to stabilize atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration at some level that might minimize the risk of dangerous climate change
:::(By "[[wikipedia:WP:SYNTHESIS|synthetic]]" I mean essays that cite reliable sources for all their factual claims, but combine them to produce conclusions not present in any particular source.)
:::I could edit what I want to say about the [[Keystone XL pipeline]] into the existing article, but my contribution would not be particularly encyclopedic, as I would be advocating for a particular course of action (namely, action to reduce the demand for liquid fuels which I believe is driving the exploitation of Canada's tar sands). Then again, the existing article is not particularly encyclopedic. But I would find it easier to say what I want to say in a user space essay, keeping my exposition coherent, and then if the community approved of working some of it into the article proper we could do that. I'm not so much interested in shaping {{SITENAME}}'s "official" stance on particular topics as to have a platform where I can work out my current positions on them. I find when I engage in online discussions, there are points I want to make which are complex, unobvious, and require a lot of background, and I can't always find an existing page on the Web somewhere that I can cite to explain what I'm talking about.
:::Alternatively I could set up a blog site and write essays on it, but I'd just as soon use my user space on {{SITENAME}} because I like editing on [[MediaWiki]]. --[[User:Teratornis|Teratornis]] 19:59, 1 November 2011 (PDT)
::::Ok, this is now getting very interesting. I see no problem at all in what you propose under existing [[A:policies]] and [[A:guidelines]]. (We only have proposed guidelines actually, and mainly have proposed policies.) And as you can see, you're being a lot more cautious and deliberate about it than much of what happens on Appropedia - which is good, because:
::::(A) it helps us decide what we want to do
::::(B) there's some flaky stuff on Appropedia - though a fair bit less now, after recent deletions and moving-to-userspace. (I've seen Lonny doing some much-needed deletion, and I've made a habit of clicking random repeatedly, tweeting/FB-sharing/"Liking" good pages and dealing with problematic pages. But I digress.)
::::In fact, the content you're proposing is the kind of thing I'd like to see a lot more of. Distinguishing between "sourced" and "synthetic" is very valuable in thinking about this. One thing we haven't had a lot of is multiple editors working on analytical/synthetic content, but I'm keen to see how it goes. There's also a place for individual perspectives that aren't directly edited by others, but I'd imagine those remaining in userspace.
::::What would make you comfortable in starting to write on Appropedia about the topics you mention - e.g. re liquid fuel and the Keystone XL pipeline? Do you want to make a proposed policy or guideline, based on what you've said above? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 22:08, 1 November 2011 (PDT)
:::::*Comfort: I'm comfortable now. (You plus me equals consensus, it seems. Just kidding - I think.) I have some notes and references on my personal (offline) wiki that I can transcribe to {{SITENAME}}. My main concern is to maximize the comfort of the rest of the community. That is, to make sure everyone who might have an interest in what I would write, whether positive or negative, understands the structure in which we can express our ideas and debate them. I think it is less than optimally productive for debate to play out in the form of [[wikipedia:WP:EDSUM|edit summaries]] to articles in article space. It would be better, I think, to let each person have their user space as a kind of refuge where they elaborate their ideas, and then we discuss on talk pages somewhere (perhaps on this page, unless it gets overloaded) what the "official" {{SITENAME}} article about a topic should say. As I mentioned, I am not too concerned about whether I agree with what the article on a topic says - I will happily defer to the community - as long as I have a place to write what I think about it. On Wikipedia, controversial articles may come to resemble [[wikipedia:Professional wrestling match types#Enclosure-based variations|steel cage matches]], I suspect in part because people with uncompromising opinions lack a separate platform where they can write what they think. Wikipedia has a policy against advocating for particular positions anywhere on the site, including user pages. I don't think we need that restriction on {{SITENAME}}, primarily because the diversity of opinion is less here. Just about everyone who edits on {{SITENAME}} probably agrees we face large environmental and humanitarian crises; any disagreements are more likely to be over the details of how we might solve them. We probably don't have too many people who, for example, explicitly deny the existence of man-made global warming. If necessary we might have something like a "Lonny test" - you can advocate for anything you want in your user space as long as [[User:Lonny|Lonny]] is cool with it. That might sound kind of facetious but in fact on every wiki what is allowable must ultimately come down to one person who has the final say, as necessary to break deadlocks when the community cannot reach consensus. (On Wikipedia, [[wikipedia:User:Jimbo|Jimbo]] has the final say, but he exercises it rarely.)
:::::*Guideline: I can work on a draft. My notes are in [[U:TT#ESSAY]].
:::::**A side note: it seems we have some "proposed" [[:Category:Appropedia proposed policies|policies]] and [[:Category:Appropedia proposed guidelines|guidelines]] that seem to remain "proposed" forever. Perhaps this is because we have primarily one user (you) who seems to propose them, and then nobody else weighs in. It would be nice to somehow tie up these loose ends. For example, if a guideline has been in the "proposed" state for more than a year, perhaps we could [[A:BOLD|be bold]] and automatically promote it to a real guideline. If someone objects later, we can always debate the guideline then. On a wiki, everything is subject to revision in perpetuity.
:::::--[[User:Teratornis|Teratornis]] 11:53, 2 November 2011 (PDT)
::::::I agree with all your comments above. I look forward to seeing your articles - I won't look at drafts right now as I need to escape the internet vortex.
::::::I'm happy with the Lonny test as a last resort - good to decide that in advance. In practice Lonny is big on consensus and not big on enforcing his opinion, but will look for a solution when someone is putting garbage on the site, so I don't foresee a problem there.
::::::"We probably don't have too many people who, for example, explicitly deny the existence of man-made global warming." Indeed. I do know one who is doubtful and suspicious of the IPCC etc, but not a hardcore "It's all a lie!" type, and not someone who'll cause problems in edit wars or major arguments on site.
::::::"For example, if a guideline has been in the "proposed" state for more than a year, perhaps we could [[A:BOLD|be bold]] and automatically promote it to a real guideline." '''First thoughts''': Sounds good. My suggestion for "best practice" is: If possible, flag the particular policies and guidelines that are planned for upgrade a week or two in advance, on Village Pump; the person who promotes it to policy/guideline status should not be the major contributor to the drafting of it; and the upgrading is announced on the Village Pump, along with a brief and accurate summary of the new policy/guideline and a note that it remains open to reversion and revision. '''Second thoughts''': If people don't actively object, there's a bias towards instruction creep{{w|Instruction creep}} here (and note the Wikipedia essay [[wikipedia:Wikipedia:Avoid instruction creep]]. At the very least, we need to ask ourselves before promoting a policy or guideline: ''Is this really necessary? Can it be simplified'' I'm ok with not everything I wrote getting approved - I'm sure I've changed my mind on some of it anyway. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 02:08, 3 November 2011 (PDT)
:::::::I consider [[wikipedia:WP:CREEP]] to be unfortunately ignorant of what actually makes Wikipedia work, which is having extremely complete written instructions. See [[wikipedia:WP:NOCOMMON|there is no common sense]]. WP:CREEP reminds me too much of those programmers with borderline [[wikipedia:Asperger syndrome]] and minimal verbal skills, who seem to believe if something is obvious to them then it is obvious to everyone. The world has many people like that who churn out confusion and horizontal fragmentation every day. (By "horizontal fragmentation" I mean making things different in ways which provide no net improvement, such as having 50 different functionally equivalent word processing programs that all have different commands to do the same tasks. Thus the urge to "simplify" by not writing detailed instructions actually ends up making things more complex, as you end up with excessive variation providing no benefit, which people must then deal with.) I'd say if WP:CREEP has a point, it would be to avoid writing bad instructions, that is instructions which do not reflect the actual practice of the editing community. But the claim that "nobody reads the instructions" is just dumbfounding - people who don't read instructions on Wikipedia simply create problems that have to be fixed by people who do read the instructions. Over time, the people who refuse to read instructions find themselves embroiled in various controversies, and they tend to get discouraged and leave. They become what [[wikipedia:Fred Brooks|Fred Brooks]] called "[http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/gbell/high_tech_ventures/00000146.htm negatively productive people]". In a dispute on Wikipedia, odds are one or both sides do not understand the relevant instructions, because most disputes on Wikipedia are repeats of past disputes, whose resolutions were encoded into guidelines or policies. Instructions (and [[wikipedia:WP:SHORTCUT|shortcuts]] that point to them) are also vital for leaving understandable [[wikipedia:WP:EDITSUMMARY|edit summaries]], especially for formal edits (edits that change the article format rather than the content).
:::::::Appropedia has far less written instruction than Wikipedia, and we suffer for it. For example, look at the inconsistency of article titles, which is what to expect when everybody relies on their (wildly diverse) common sense. See my notes about this problem in [[U:TT#Naming convention]]. One might think this sort of inconsistency does not matter, but I believe it does, since it discourages collaboration. When an article's style reflects the idiosyncrasies of some particular person, another person may feel inhibited about contributing, since that runs the risk of confronting the original author over a style issue instead of the content. When a site enforces a consistent style site-wide, then it is much easier for additional users to contribute, since they have fewer questions about what they should do, and therefore fewer things to argue about. Ultimately, if there are enough rules and instructions, editing could (almost) be reduced to an algorithm. --[[User:Teratornis|Teratornis]] 12:32, 1 August 2012 (PDT)
{{undent}} I agree in part - certainly there are matters such as page titles where we do need to have a convention and stick to it, or else we continue to not look professional. (Technically we're not meant to be professional, being a volunteer collaboration, but you get my drift.)<br>
Maybe there are ways we could make instructions & policies easier to follow - e.g. have a "human-readable version" at the top of the page, a la CC licenses. Something could be done with documentation on templates, as well - I don't know if it's the format, but Wikipedia-style documentation is hard to read for me. Makes my eyes glaze over - I can only guess how a non-wikiholic would feel looking at such documentation. (I value the porting efforts - we do need those instructions. I'm just wondering if simple things like spacing and changing the background color would improve readability over the Wikipedia-style layout.) --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 10:16, 4 August 2012 (PDT)
:On the difference between "looking professional" and "being professional":
:* To "be professional" we would have to get paid to contribute. We don't, so we aren't, in the technical sense.
:* However, we can still "look professional" in the sense that the work we do for free is of high enough quality to be worth paying for. The Open Source movement is based on this premise - free stuff would not be as compelling if it was always guaranteed to be of lower quality than proprietary stuff. Proprietary vendors would have little to fear from open source in that case. Obviously, if open source material is to be credible, it must be of the same standard as copyrighted stuff. And one thing all competent publishers have is a consistent style, either across all their material, or at a minimum within each publication. When you see a publication that looks like a [[wikipedia:rebus|rebus]], it's harder to take seriously. A volunteer collaboration that is harder to take seriously will tend to put off serious collaborators. That is, the people who are capable of producing professional-quality content and might do it for free.
:On the difficulty of reading documentation:
:* Wikipedia's instructions are difficult for many people to read, in a start to finish sense like one reads a novel. They are probably difficult even for most Wikipedia editors to read that way. And yet Wikipedia's pages show remarkable conformance to its rules, such as [[wikipedia:WP:LAYOUT]] and the rest of the style and naming conventions. How can this be? Quite easily: Wikipedia obviously does not rely on everybody reading all the rules start to finish like a novel before they get started. New editors will unwittingly violate many rules. More experienced editors will correct their violations, and leave [[wikipedia:WP:EDITSUMMARY|edit summaries]] that refer to the rules (or better which link to the rules being applied via [[A:SC|shortcuts]] e.g. [[wikipedia:WP:LOWERCASE]]). A new editor who notices that something he or she edited has changed can look at the [[wikipedia:WP:PAGEHISTORY|history]] of a page, read the relevant edit summary, and browse directly to the rule that was applied. As long as the link destination is a reasonably self-contained description of that rule, the new editor should be able to comprehend it, and then go on to apply it to other non-conforming edits while leaving the same quality of breadcrumb documentation in edit summaries. In this way the rules get woven into the structure of the edit histories of many pages, making each page self-documenting in terms of its rule violations and corrections. Thus each new editor can be efficiently apprenticed by experienced editors, and can possibly avoid ever having to read all the rules straight through like a novel (although there is value to doing so at some point, to get a global view of the individual rules he or she had internalized from experience).
:* A person's eyes "glaze over" when they read voluminous material that is irrelevant to what they are thinking about at the moment. Wikipedia's rules are extremely detailed, to cover every possible case. A given editor probably doesn't run into every possible case. Thus the [[wikipedia:Pareto rule]] applies - a small percentage of the rules will be relevant to a given editor most of the time. The beauty of accessing the rule documentation via edit summaries is that the editor is then highly likely to be looking at rules which are personally relevant, namely rules that answer the question the editor has framed at that time: why did this other editor change my stuff? Getting the answer to your question is highly relevant and allows your brain to bring its full concentration to bear. Hence, no eyes glazing over.
:--[[User:Teratornis|Teratornis]] 11:59, 5 November 2012 (PST)


== Interesting small wikis ==
I'm outa here, folks.  Good luck with everything.  Joe


Prompted by a comment by Teratornis [[#User tools for spam fighting?|above]], I've been thinking about good small wikis. I agree it's hard to find good small wikis as they don't have the resources of the Wikimedia wikis, but here are some that I found interesting in various ways:
:We've chatted by email, but again, many thanks for your great work, Joe. I wish you all the best with your next adventures. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 17:53, 14 October 2013 (PDT)
* http://www.grassrootswiki.org - nice skin & front page. (Not active, though about half a year ago they organized a worthwhile meetup of development wikis, which I joined by phone.)
* [[Greenlivingpedia:|Greenlivingpedia]] - smaller than Appropedia, but with a high average quality of articles. Largely the work of one guy, Peter Campbell who I've met a few times as he's a fellow Australian. Not at the bleeding edge, but he keeps on top of the tech side.
* http://www.richmondwiki.org/wiki - I came across their blog - looks like they keep up to date & understand the tech side well
* [[Wikia:|Wikia]] - the leading wiki farm/community of communities, have developed some social features & have clearly put thought into what gets people engaged. I have mixed feelings on the features - some I like, but mostly I need to look more closely at how they're used.
Fan wikis - there are a bunch of them, many on Wikia. One that impresses me is:
* http://battlestarwiki.org - nicely maintained, active wiki.


The fact that many of the successful smaller wikis revolve around tv shows or movies tells us something crucial - humans tend to engage based on fun, stories and shared passions. The brutal truth seems to be that we evolved to gossip more than we evolved to care for or environment, or for people outside our immediate group. But I don't want to focus on something I can't change, so I'm interested in how we can harness fun & stories, & channel our passions. But that another set of topics :). --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 11:03, 16 July 2011 (PDT)
== Pages that advertise green businesses ==
:Yes, humans remain intensely interested in redecorating the ''Titanic'' even as they begin sliding down the listing deck. One sees the same thing on Wikipedia, with the detailed articles about every known footballer, anime character, and anything else that is useless to know. The vast majority of humans are oblivious to the fact that our fossil fuel habit is [http://www.skepticalscience.com/co2-rising-ten-times-faster-than-petm-extinction.html increasing the carbon dioxide content of the Earth's atmosphere at an even faster rate] than it increased leading to the [[wikipedia:Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum|Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum]] - the most catastrophic known period of natural climate change to hit the Earth during the Age of Mammals. If humans had any idea of how dire our situation is, we'd have all hands on deck working toward the needed solution, which is to figure how we are going to drive everyone's carbon footprint below two tonnes per year (or maybe less) as quickly as possible. It is abundantly clear that our [[wikipedia:evolutionary psychology|evolutionary psychology]] is still optimized for advancing our social prospects in the Pleistocene, not for coping with the consequences of our advanced technology. --[[User:Teratornis|Teratornis]] 21:59, 16 July 2011 (PDT)
::There are a good number people who gather online to share ideas about tackling climate change. This tends to happen most on sites that cater to people's social wiring. The challenge for us to find ways to work with that, but make connections with knowledge resources to help make change. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 21:51, 20 July 2011 (PDT)


:The [http://wiki.cancer.org.au/australia/Main_Page Cancer Council Australia Wiki] is an interesting wiki. It uses Semantic forms, and clinicians have managed to fill out pages by themselves. It also has specific places within articles to invite comments - using extensions/tweaks developed by [[wikipedia:User:Werdna]] (who also develops the coming LiquidThreads 3.0 for the Wikimedia Foundation, among other things). The current policy is to have a comment section for each section of an article. Not that we'd want to copy that. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 18:33, 19 January 2012 (PST) ''edited description of Cancer Council Wiki. [[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 19:12, 30 January 2012 (PST)''
I removed the {{tlx|delete|advertising}} from [[Beyond Building Energy]]. We have been allowing sustainable businesses to have pages about themselves. I like having such pages, especially where they have information that might be valuable to a reader, but we need to work out clearer limits. E.g. is [[Beyond Building Energy]] the sort of page we want to have on Appropedia? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 21:35, 19 November 2013 (PST)


[http://meatballwiki.org/wiki/ Meatball Wiki] and [http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?WelcomeVisitors Portland Pattern Repository] are pioneer wikis using the UseModWiki engine, about programming and online communities - they're still maintained, and run on . --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 20:43, 9 June 2012 (PDT)
* Maybe there is a need for a template for sustainability-oriented businesses or organisations? I.E. not a delete template, but something to the effect that it is a business, Appropedia does not endorse businesses or their products, but allows relevant ones a page, so the reader should do their own research etc. I also think its ok, as long as they don't try to start inserting lots of "advertorial" style content in more Encyclopaedic pages (an issue we had a while back on [[Public transport]]). --[[User:PatSunter|PatSunter]] ([[User talk:PatSunter|talk]]) 21:06, 14 March 2014 (PDT)


== An "Attic" for dubious articles ==
::Thanks Pat, good approach, I think. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 04:58, 17 April 2014 (PDT)


Speaking of deleting pages... Where there's any ambiguity about deleting a page, but the page is not suitable in its current form, one option is the Russian Wikipedia solution. That is, all unsuitable pages, e.g. about someone's cat, get moved to a namespace meant for that purpose. The pages can be recovered later - e.g. if the cat becomes famous, in Wikipedia's case ;-). For our case, we could move such pages to [[Appropedia:Attic/PAGENAME]]. Just an idea.
::Yes, good approach. Here's another wiki's page on the topic: [https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Wikivoyage:Welcome,_business_owners]? [[User:Pashley|Pashley]] ([[User talk:Pashley|talk]]) 10:57, 17 April 2014 (PDT)


Another way is to move the article to someone's userspace. But the advantage of the "Attic" is that anyone can browse all such articles if they want.
== spammness ==


Either way, best practice would be to uncheck the box to create a redirect when moving. If the page isn't very good, we don't want to direct people there from mainspace.  
Hey I am sorry but I face the spam problem too. I've tried change the content of the page Cshr25, and I was sure I got logged in. No idea why it treated me as a spammer.<br />
I couldn't even leave a message on the supporter's page. {{unsigned|Cshr25 |21 January 2014}}


Maybe I'm thinking too much... anyway, please comment if you have preferences either way. And... happy new year! --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 20:58, 7 January 2012 (PST)
:(For the record, this was resolved. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 04:46, 17 April 2014 (PDT))


:To me, the "Attic" sounds a lot like the [[Wikipedia:Wikipedia:Article Incubator]] - a place for nonindexed pages deemed worthy of further work before returning them to article space. All this raises three basic questions for me. What are the criteria for userfying a page? What are the criteria for throwing a page into the Attic/Incubator? Most importantly, what are the criteria for a page to remain in article space? The more I play [http://www.appropedia.org/Special:Random Surprise me!] the more I think there very easily could be (put your number here) of articles that wouldn't meet even basic criteria for inclusion in article space, and iffy in Attic/Incubator space. What this says to me is Appropedia article space absolutely could use some cleaning up, one way or another. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 17:17, 8 January 2012 (PST)
== Exemplar city? ==


::Thanks RichardF... and for anyone reading this old discussion, please see [[A:Incubator]]. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 20:18, 2 April 2013 (PDT)
An article [http://www.directionsmag.com/channels/remote-sensing/articles/huntsville-alabama-an-exemplar-city-model-for-geospatial-energy-and-cy/393539] on work in Huntsville, Alabama on tornado resistance, "micro-grid" energy sources, sustainable tech, ... [[User:Pashley|Pashley]] ([[User talk:Pashley|talk]]) 11:18, 15 April 2014 (PDT)


== Speculative and potentially dangerous content ==
:That's very cool! I wonder what it would take to find students interested in developing pages on this. This touches on a bunch of important topics. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 04:36, 17 April 2014 (PDT)


How should we deal with speculative content? What if it's for potentially dangerous applications, such as designing microlights and other aircraft?
== Solar at Canadian latitudes? ==


I've moved some content of this type to userspace, and deleted some content that I was particularly concerned about. See the discussion at [[User talk:KVDP #Your autogyro]] and [[User talk:Chriswaterguy #Aircraft images]] for some of my reasoning.
An Indian reservation with a [http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/thunder-bay/deer-lake-first-nation-cuts-ribbon-on-solar-project-1.2612020 solar project]. This is a fairly isolated community; I do not think it is on the electric grid or that it is reachable by road. It is not in the far North, only Northern Ontario so laititude below 60. [[User:Pashley|Pashley]] ([[User talk:Pashley|talk]]) 19:59, 17 April 2014 (PDT)


But I'd like to know what you, fellow Appropedians, think about this. ([[A:Be bold|Be bold]] is a great policy, but I try to be less bold with admin actions.). --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 21:03, 23 February 2012 (PST)
== New type of axe for splitting wood ==
:My first question would be about the legal implications. Aviation is heavily regulated in most civilized countries, so we'd have to avoid steering anyone in an illegal direction. My second question would be about whether the technology in question makes any attempt to be sustainable. Powered flight in its current form is (probably) the branch of transport technology most dependent on fossil fuels, in particular liquid fuels from petroleum. Powered flight places severe demands on the energy storage to weight ratio of an energy carrier. Flying is one of the most unsustainable activities an ordinary person might engage in. If {{SITENAME}} is going to promote any kind of flying, it should not rely on burning fossil fuels. Unless someone has figured out a way to do that, I think we have an endless number of more appropriate and sustainable things to write about. --[[User:Teratornis|Teratornis]] 20:53, 28 August 2012 (PDT)
::Great points. If someone has designs for a solar and/or human powered aircraft that has actually flown, I'd be happy to see this on Appropedia (with a big safety disclaimer, of course, plus something about regulatory issues). Then we're talking demonstration technology rather than practical transport solutions, but these things have value in technological development.  --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 02:31, 11 September 2012 (PDT)


== URL to black list ==
Where does [http://www.geek.com/news/physics-exploiting-axe-splits-wood-in-record-time-1591725/ this] fit in? Inventor & press make some rather strong claims for it. [[User:Pashley|Pashley]] ([[User talk:Pashley|talk]]) 16:03, 22 April 2014 (PDT)


There has been a lot of spam pointing to www DOT bigfreddy DOT com/nl/foto/aluminium/foto . Perhaps a domain we could blacklist? --[[User:Tahnok|Tahnok]] 07:19, 12 March 2012 (PDT)
== Content types ==


:Thanks. I hadn't noticed that, or your comment, till now. I can't see any reason for anyone to post links to that site, on Appropedia, so I added the whole domain to [[MediaWiki:Spam-blacklist]]. I think the best approach is to use your judgement (since you have edit permissions for the blacklist) - we can always revert if there's a problem. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 04:11, 15 August 2012 (PDT)
I can tell there's been a lot of effort to organize Appropedia by topics/ subject matter. But I'm wondering if there's been much in the way of organizing by content type? Appropedia's content is much broader than traditional wikis. From what I can see there's: 1) articles, 2) manuals/ how-tos, 3) specific project/ experiment write-ups, and 4) raw data. Maybe we could have a convo about if this kind of organization would be helpful for users and if so how to do it. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 19:06, 22 April 2014 (PDT)


== Approforce! (Really?) ==
:Agreed - a good start would be clarifying the exact classifications for pages we have. "Designs" seems like another type of content, but perhaps these will fit into projects or how-tos. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 02:00, 23 April 2014 (PDT)


A question from our Facebook page - answer either here or there: [https://www.facebook.com/questions/10150727037084425/ What should we call a collaboration by a group of editors to improve a certain area of Appropedia, or to do a certain kind of task? This would help people know what needs work and what other people are up to, and provide a place to discuss strategy.]
:Another kind of content is essays. These may be high in narrative or experience, e.g. [[Reversing Soil Degradation of Agricultural Lands]]. These are about the topic, but probably should stand alone, separate from a topic page. I'd like to have a naming convention, so they can be easily recognised. Should they start with "Essay:"? Should they be capitalised? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 05:28, 21 August 2014 (PDT)


Not many answers yet, but the most popular suggestions so far are Approcolab and Approforce. Not sure if I can make the question visible to non-FB users, so here's the full list:
::As I was organizing the permaculture category, I realized that designs are an essential area to work on. Perhaps we could use custom namespaces. I see that there's already Original: , but that seems to have more to do with attribution than content type. Another option might just be to use categories, but I don't know if it would make site navigation feel messy to have content types and subject matter organized that way. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 10:18, 17 May 2015 (PDT)
* ApproCoLab
* Approjam
* Approclean
* Collabropedia
* DiaT
* Approforce
* Approject
* Approlab
* Approteam
* Collaboration
* ApproProject
* MetaProject
* WikiProject


I added Approforce, thinking that if I added something deliberately bad, others would come up with something better. Maybe it's not that bad... or maybe it really is. (Reminds me of the cry of "G-Force" from ''Battle of the Planets'' - showing my age...) Please vote & comment. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 06:18, 8 May 2012 (PDT)
== Food crops & nitrogen-fixing bacteria ==


== Recent changes IRC channel ==
Three teenaged Irish girls got the top prize at a Google Science Fair with work that looks rather interesting:
http://www.independent.ie/business/technology/news/irish-teenagers-bag-top-prize-at-google-science-fair-2014-30607710.html


I have set up an [irc://irc.freenode.net/#appropedia-rc IRC channel with recent changes], similar to those which Wikimedia Foundation runs for its wikis. So you can hang your bots or yourself there now and follow happenings on Appropedia in real time.
== Is anyone interested in a guide to Greenwashing? ==


Similarly to Wikimedia channels, only Recent changes bot (<code>[appropedia-rc]</code>) can post on channel.
I would like to make a page on the practice of companies presenting themselves as environmentally friendly when they are not in reality (a.k.a. "greenwashing") but I'm not sure if it's something the community is interested in: this isn't a guide for a specific project or proposal for a kind of technology. Is this fit for Appropedia? [[User:Koavf|Koavf]] ([[User talk:Koavf|talk]]) 10:43, 7 October 2014 (PDT)


If you encounter any weirdness, feel free to contact me either via email or directly on IRC.
:I think it's a good fit for Appropedia.
:(Searching…) Aha – we have a page called [[greenwash]]. What do you think of moving that to [[greenwashing]] and developing it further? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 16:07, 7 October 2014 (PDT)
::Ha. I didn't even think to search [[greenwash]]. I'll see if I can add to that. Thanks. [[User:Koavf|Koavf]] ([[User talk:Koavf|talk]]) 10:12, 9 October 2014 (PDT)


Enjoy the new way to follow Appropedia!
== Any overlap here? ==


[[User:Danny B.|Danny B.]] 07:58, 23 May 2012 (PDT)
[http://www.survivorlibrary.com/ Survivor Library], for tech that might work after collapse of civilisation. e.g. An early 20th century text on X-rays, the idea being that with that plus basic electrical & glass-blowing skills you might be able to build a medically useful machine from scratch.


:Thanks Danny!
This is not closely related to anything we do here, but it might include some books of interest. It seems worth a link, but where? [[User:Pashley|Pashley]] ([[User talk:Pashley|talk]]) 08:35, 28 October 2014 (PDT)


:A general notice: The [irc://irc.freenode.net/#appropedia #appropedia channel] is also active. [[A:IRC]] gives instructions on joining (using your browser at http://webchat.freenode.net/ or using a client such as Pidgin, Chatzilla or xchat. Danny B., Amgine, Tahnok & I are often there. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 20:52, 9 June 2012 (PDT)


== Online schools ==
:Cool! Probably we want a {{tlc|Collapse}}, or {{tlc|Post collapse}}? We don't have a lot of content directly addressing this, but it's definitely on topic. (Personally, I think the chances of modern society really collapsing are very low. ''However'', I do believe in being prepared, and that compiling the info has other benefits.)
:So, where... an initial article could be called [[Recovering from collapse]], say? Just a thought. Be bold :). --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 20:16, 29 October 2014 (PDT)
::Love it. I often think of appropriate technologies as epi-apocalyptic technologies that we build in the race against collapse. The bonus is that if we do not make it in time, the technology knowledge can be there for the rebuild/re-imagine. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 21:29, 29 October 2014 (PDT)
:::From the looks of it, the content of the site is mostly public domain manuals/ how-tos from the 19th-early 20th century. Certainly there's a lot of commonalities between what people were doing then and the current approaches of appropriate tech and the transition movement. But there's also plenty of "bad ideas" from back then (like just about any application of lead). That aside, how could these two sites interact? Appropedia seems to be pretty averse to PDFs, which is Survivor Library's bread and butter. For the present SL can be used to identify content areas we're lacking here (like beekeeping) and linking to those that are covered here. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 09:38, 17 May 2015 (PDT)


Here's a site many of us here might find interesting.
== Media idea ==
Hi been a long time.. just checking in to say that I've been thinking in a similar way about this, thinking that there are few forms of media which are written as if collapse is a real possibility (and, having been to a few academic conferences about this in recent months, I think it is a lot more likely than many might think) - or even if it isn't, talking as if the changes we need to make to our lifestyles in the face of climate change are real, serious and urgent.  Which, I think, probably amount to the same kind of thing.  I was even vaguely contemplating starting a [http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Main_Page wikinews] clone to start putting out news written on that basis.  Oh yes, I forgot to say that since I've been away, I've kinda become a journalist.. as you do! [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] ([[User talk:Joeturner|talk]]) 09:20, 10 November 2014 (PST)


'''[http://www.onlineschools.org/ Online Schools] - Who We Are'''<br>
:Hi Joe. Thumbs up for all those thoughts.  
"Online Schools aims to be the premier portal for online education on the web. Our goal is not to revolutionize the concept of education, but rather to help bring people into the 21st century in terms of the way they perceive learning. Education is no longer simply about teachers and textbooks. In today's Internet age, education is now about infographics, blogs, e-books, web articles, YouTube, Wikipedia, and so much more. Thus, we at Online Schools do not propose to revolutionize education itself, but rather, we strive to revolutionize the way people think about and approach education.
:Could Appropedia be the platform, or at least an incubator, for your news site idea? (Side note: "Collapsonomics" springs to mind for the economics section of such a project.) --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 14:48, 10 November 2014 (PST)


"That said, first and foremost, we do believe that all individuals should have a strong foundation in traditional learning, evidenced by our emphasis on providing honest, up-to-date and readily available information on [http://www.onlineschools.org/online-schools/ accredited online schools]."
::Hi Chris - well I'm really throwing it out for discussion rather than suggesting that I have a 'ready made' idea.  There are significant problems with the model from wikinews which makes it very bland and has a very tortuous process to get to publication - I am not sure that is really necessary.  Also there is no need to feel pressure to generate a lot of daily content.  So I guess I'm thinking something which is a bit more than a blog, but a lot less work than a full news site - perhaps including interviews with people involved in relevant stuff (including but not exclusively appropredia projects), discussion of relevant issues etc.  It could, perhaps, be intended to be a monthly mag (newsletter or whatever) but with articles coming out as and when during that time.


'''United States [http://www.onlineschools.org/guides/ Schools Directory]'''<br>
::I think it could work as opensource - providing everyone understood some basic rules and there were some protections to prevent people getting misquoted etc.  I suppose I see it a bit more like an open review system to improve content which is eventually 'published' (and no longer open for editing).  Dunno, just a thought really. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] ([[User talk:Joeturner|talk]]) 02:41, 11 November 2014 (PST)
"Our Schools Directory is, in our opinion, the best online [United States] colleges and universities resource available anywhere on the web. Hundreds of Online Schools staff members have put in thousands of hours to compile the scores of information needed to create this unparalleled database.


"Our unique and fully comprehensive database provides you with valuable information about every online program that is offered at every school in every state across the nation in the following categories: Online Certificate Programs, Online Certification, Online Training Programs, Online Associates Degree Programs, Online Bachelors Degree Programs, Online Masters Degree Programs, Online MBA Programs and Online PhD Programs.  
:::''"I'm thinking something which is a bit more than a blog, but a lot less work than a full news site - perhaps including interviews with people involved in relevant stuff (including but not exclusively appropredia projects), discussion of relevant issues etc."'' – I like it. To do it in a collaborative way means that an existing site (with lots of suitable users already registered) would be a good place, but maybe that's my bias. To do it in an open source way, MediaWiki has some advantages.
:::In any case it sounds like something that I'd like to support, partly because it's a good idea and partly because I know that you're smart and no-nonsense. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 16:16, 24 November 2014 (PST)


"You no longer need to waste your time trying to figure out how best to search for the most accurate or relevant information on the subject you are interested in studying. Simply use our directory, choosing your state and start browsing through the list of schools that offer pertinent online educational options. If your course of study exists in an online format, you will find it here, guaranteed."
:Sounds like a potentially great project, Joe. I've been watching the collapse discourse for awhile. What info sources there are leave a lot to be desired. The main thing I'd like to see is something with a lot more fact-based approach. There are some staid and insightful media like John Michael Greer's blog and the C-Realm podcast, but there's also a lot of tin foil types. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 09:54, 17 May 2015 (PDT)


--[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 06:13, 13 July 2012 (PDT)
== Farm Hack ==


== TOCbox template ==
[[Farm Hack]] looks like prime partners for Appropedia - we should be encouraging cross pollination. -- [[User:J.M.Pearce|Joshua]] ([[User talk:J.M.Pearce|talk]]) 06:38, 6 February 2015 (PST)
:Thanks Joshua. I'll drop them a line. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 05:04, 7 February 2015 (PST)


Here's a new template - {{tl|TOCbox}} - that can come in handy for pages, like this one, with long tables of contents.  Among other things, you can set the width and height of this TOC-right-in-a-box. The default size is auto width and 500px high, about 25 lines. The optional parameters are listed below.
== LH side bar link for sustainable community action ==


;Simple version
There are now quite a few (c. 300) pages in the [[:Category:Sustainable community action]]. It'd be good if we could have some kind of link from the left hand menu (just to [[Sustainable community action]], the sca main page), perhaps near the collaborators box? {{unsigned|Philralph|17 February 2015‎}}
<pre>
{{TOCbox}}
</pre>


;Optional paramaters
:Thanks Philralph – you're doing great work. I added it under "areas", as "Community action" so that it fits. ("Collaborators" was intended for external partners, so it didn't seem right.) How is that? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 15:16, 23 February 2015 (PST)
<pre>
{{TOCbox
  |width=
  |height=
  |font-size=
  |border-width=
  |border-color=
}}
</pre>


;Defaults
::Excellent! Thanks Chris [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 01:27, 24 February 2015 (PST)
  |width=auto - can be % or px
  |height=auto - can be px, 500px = about 25 lines
  |font-size=96% - can be px
  |border-width=0px
  |border-color=#A3BFA3 - can be name


Let me know if this template needs tweaking. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 13:12, 20 July 2012 (PDT)
== Translation students on Wikipedia ==


I added the scrolling box feature to {{tl|TOC right}}, making the new template unnecessary. This way, the new box capabilities already are added to existing {{tl|TOC right}} pages. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 09:33, 21 July 2012 (PDT)
Sharing this link because it may be relevant to Appropedia and Ekopedia, as we work to connect the different language wikis: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2014-01-29/Recent_research Translation students embrace Wikipedia assignments, but find user interface frustrating]. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 04:44, 24 Februa ry 2015 (PST)
:: What's the progress on that project? I'd be glad to help port stuff once I'm finished with Permaculture.info. Unfortunately, I don't know French, but it looks like there's lots of great English-language content and images. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 09:17, 17 May 2015 (PDT)


After looking at some pages using {{tl|TOC right}}, I changed the box default height to auto, so that short TOCs don't have lots of white space below them. The height still can be set for long TOCs to keep their display within the viewing window. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 13:01, 21 July 2012 (PDT)
== Self-healing concrete? ==
Slashdot points to an article on [http://www.cnn.com/2015/05/14/tech/bioconcrete-delft-jonkers/index.html bio-concrete]; it contains bacteria which fix cracks. [[User:Pashley|Pashley]] ([[User talk:Pashley|talk]]) 10:09, 15 May 2015 (PDT)


:Accessibility note: This approach creates various accessibility issues. TOC is one of the most important parts of pages used for people with disabilities to navigate on page comfortably and this lowers down the comfort or in certain cases almost disables this navigation. Furthermore, on keyboard-less devices, such as tablets, scrollbar of scrolling area is not being displayed, so one may think that the TOC has say 25 items, while it has 50, but those are hidden and no indication of it. If I may suggest, I would strongly discourage you from using this approach.<br />Kind regards<br />— [[User:Danny B.|Danny B.]] 13:10, 21 July 2012 (PDT)
== Year of Soil & Light ==
This is a bit late as the year's almost half over, but it would be cool if we could do something for the International Year of Soil and Light (as declared by the UN). Perhaps some kind of work party or months-long effort to add relevant content. At the very least it could get a mention on the front page. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 10:03, 17 May 2015 (PDT)


::Okay. I already changed to default height back to auto. Having over 25 TOC items causes it's own problems. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 13:49, 21 July 2012 (PDT)
:Oops, I haven't been checking this page, sorry! That's a good idea. Perhaps there are existing pages that could be highlighted also? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 05:28, 12 June 2015 (PDT)


:::Time to do some archiving. Wiki talk pages are messy - I want us to get some funding to put in either a forum that integrates well with MediaWiki, or a native wiki forum like DPLforum LiquidThreads. ([[User:JRWR]] insists he's ironed the bugs out of LiquidThreads on his wiki.) --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 00:13, 5 August 2012 (PDT)
== Instructables ==
As J.M.Pearce mentioned, [[Instructables]] has some material that could be ported here. But there's a snag. If I understand right, Appropedia avoids BY-NC-SA material. That license appears to be the default on Instructables, so the majority of content is licensed that way. I want there to be a quick way to look up BY-SA content, but I'm stumped. CC's own search utility doesn't include Instructables. Trying to combine a reverse image search of the BY-SA image combined with the string "site:instructables.com" didn't work. Any suggestions? I don't want to waste time going through stuff we can't take. (Incidentally, I was reminded of the website's existence by finding a book of "off-grid" projects compiled by the site's founder. Is he violating his own users' licenses!?) --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 21:56, 20 May 2015 (PDT)


== News for editors ==
It turns out there is alttext on the license images. So you can enter the search string "site:instructables.com attribution sharealike -noncommercial" to get (mostly) relevant results. I created the template <nowiki>{{Instructables}}</nowiki> to provide attribution for imported material. [[TCMTECH dripper irrigation for rainbarrel]] is an example of what an imported page can look like. It might also be nice to notify the content creator.


Here's a nice idea: [https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:News_for_editors Wiktionary:News for editors]. "This page keeps editors abreast of recent clarifications of or changes to policy or best current practice, major changes to templates, and the like."
Side note: There's been some discussion discussion about CC license violation [http://www.instructables.com/community/A-few-thoughts-about-copyright-and-Instructables/ 1], [http://www.instructables.com/community/Enforceability-of-CC-Non-Commercial-license/ 2] --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 13:04, 21 May 2015 (PDT)


It could also give news on new or lesser-known features and tools. For us, the news could include:
:Hey, nice effort with the "site:instructables.com attribution sharealike -noncommercial" search.
* [[Special:ReplaceText]] - tell an admin if there's a correction to be made on many wiki pages
:Yeah, it's unfortunate about the incompatible licenses. What we are always able to do, regardless of license or copyright, is post a summary or paraphrase together with a link. I think that's still very useful, as it becomes information that can be found by browsing Appropedia (e.g. going through the pages in a category), even if the full version must be viewed elsewhere. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 05:26, 12 June 2015 (PDT)
* [[Help:Semantic MediaWiki|Semantic MediaWiki]]. (It would be great to have a simple example of "how you can use Semantic MediaWiki on Appropedia. I haven't learnt to use it yet, other than in the [[Medical devices]] area where it's already been set up.)
* [[Appropedia:Widgets|Widgets]]).
* {{tl|notice}} and {{tl|slim notice}} allowing you to create a notice with any text and a choice of colors and widths.
* {{tl|attrib}}
* {{tl|TOC right}}
First draft at [[Appropedia:News for editors]]. I need to attend to other things... I might do something in a few weeks if no one beats me to it. I'd be very happy if someone takes it on :-). --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 00:29, 5 August 2012 (PDT)


== Let's have a monthly meeting - 2nd Sunday of the month? ==
== Articles about individuals - need guidelines ==


See [[Appropedia:IRC #Regular meetings]].  
There were a couple of articles about individuals in mainspace, that were a bit promotional in nature. That's not fundamentally a bad thing, but it's not what Appropedia mainspace is for, I think. So, I've moved them to the [[A:userspace|userspace]] of the user that created the pages.


2nd Sunday of the month, 10pm UTC. I think that's 3pm PDT (US Pacific Coast), and 8am Mon AEST (Australia).  
We want to be clear and consistent, so my suggested guideline is that articles about people need to be notable in some way. If they meet [[wikipedia:project:Notability|Wikipedia's notability criteria]] and they're relevant to Appropedia's themes, they can be in mainspace.  


Who's interested? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 04:24, 5 August 2012 (PDT)
We can be more flexible than Wikipedia, though, e.g. by counting popular sustainability/development blogs as "reliable sources" that count towards notability.


: Sounds good to me! (5pm EST) --[[User:Tahnok|Tahnok]] 13:16, 5 August 2012 (PDT)
What are your thoughts? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 05:43, 12 June 2015 (PDT)


::Great! Let's start this month - Sunday 12 August (Monday morning in Asia/Australia/NZ). --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 10:16, 6 August 2012 (PDT)
::I've been thinking about this a little bit, but not about the notability aspect. There's several individuals and their work that I'd like to profile. In many cases the individual is more or less synonymous with the organization they head or the technique they developed. [[Sepp Holzer]] is a perfect example which already exists on the wiki. I can't imagine anyone whose biographical details will be sufficient (for the purpose of this wiki) to justify their own article. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]])


==Some article Renaming==
Although I allready did a lot of work on it, there are still significant issues with [[vegetable oil as fuel]] and, [[Waste vegetable oil]], [[Pure plant oil as fuel]].
I would propose to rename vegetable oil as fuel to [[Plant oil as fuel]], Waste vegetable oil to [[Waste plant oil as fuel]]. The vegetable oil as fuel/Plant oil as fuel can then mention both (PPO and WPO), giving a reason of existance to this article.
Another thing I'd like to see renamed is [[Vegetable oils and fats]], can we rename this to [[Plant oils and fat]] I saw the term allready being used at http://www.cyberlipid.org/glycer/glyc0005.htm , and I feel that besides being more logical (as the oils aren't derived from vegetables), it will also increase traffick to the articles since it's immediatelly clear it isn't a copy of the -similarly named- wikipedia article. Let me know whether someone else or I can change the names, after that I can clean it up and add additional info


Can btw a Green tuning category be created at Portal:Green_living ? I'm especially thinking of  placing http://www.appropedia.org/PPO_single_tank_system and http://www.appropedia.org/PPO_two_tank_system in this category after we added a list of commercial companies distributing conversion kits for both. [[Special:Contributions/91.182.156.99|91.182.156.99]] 01:28, 6 August 2012 (PDT) aka User:KVDP
Hi Appropedia,
I have a question, and have looked around a bounch and am still not sure where to post it. First, I so appreciate that you have made this website exist!  It is of such great service to the world, and has so much potential to do even more!


Hello 91.182.156.99 yeah nice work :) I largely agree with your proposals - possibly 'used cooking oils' rather than 'waste plant oils' (in my mind a better description + helps to make it not be thought of as waste)
I would like to share resources that involve individual's discoveries.   


:: Hmm, used cooking oils sounds good, but then perhaps not only cooking oils may be reused ? Also, the short for it would be UCO, which sounds weird, and far-off from WVO, WPO (waste plant oils) is closer to this more commonly used term. 
1) is it OK to share about any one who is already dead?
2) is it OK to share about people who are living by putting a link to a third party? if that third party is a professional certifying body that might get into a gray area of promotion.  I also do not know most of the people who work in the field, but the field itself should have the right to articulate who belongs in it.  Also, attribution for the general category should be given (founder of the certifying body, called ISMETA, whose name escapes me, coined the term "somatic education" and "movement education" which can cover multiple methods of teaching movement.
3) ISMETA also includes movement _therapy_ which is not, by its nature, open source, as far as I understand it (unless you would consider someone offering to be a physical therapist without any training and claiming to heal conditions to be using material they've read in an open-source fashion).  How do I handle this?  is it enough to simply give a disclaimer?


I think there can be problems with listing kit vendors - I'll put something on the appropriate talk pages about this.  Think you may have kicked me back into doing some more work on the biofuels portal :) --[[User:Darren|Darren]] 04:51, 13 August 2012 (PDT)
Thanks!
--JoshuaDM


:: Hi Darren, you can contact me further via my user page (user:KVDP). I see that you worked on something called the Open Biofuel Engine. Perhaps we can work on this further, I allready have a 3D design of a line engine (gasoline) which can run on several fuels. I think that by just integrating compression ignition rather than using spark plugs we can make it a "diesel engine" for running on biofuels.
:Hi Joshua. There's no problem with sharing about someone who is already dead, and providing a suitable link is always helpful. A verifying body could make sense.  
[[Special:Contributions/91.182.31.72|91.182.31.72]] 08:33, 14 August 2012 (PDT)


==Projects==
:An article being to promotional wouldn't ever be about a single link - it's the overall emphasis and balance of the article.  
I recently became more and more aware that the development of projects does not happen with a same pace as the development of articles. In addition, we often have several similar projects (for example several designs of chicken coops, ...). I am thinking that projects are being worked out more rapidly as the wiki itself as students at Humboldt probably get points for their project design (and for them, it thus helps to keep the project simple), but not really for articles not do they get extra credits for making their project really useful. I think it may be beneficial that other people would suggest projects (and perhaps articles) that are more meaningful/useful in the intrest of our mission. For example:
* LV/HV transformer construction manual; see http://www.isf-iai.be/index.php?id=69
* ISF rice huller 3D model (I still have 3D components from ISF, but the full thing still needs to be made
* manual oil presses (for extracting vegetable oil), ie the Journeytoforever presses, see http://www.appropedia.org/Decentralised_pure_plant_oil_fuel_production
* a open-design hot plate (cooker) design
* a open-design diesel engine capable of running on vegetable oil (see http://www.appropedia.org/PPO_single_tank_system ). The engine should have push rods, carburetter (no direct injection), perhaps base the PPO-system on the lovecraft biofuels system (simple, few parts)
* a open-design airoponics or air-dynaponics system (see http://www.appropedia.org/X_ponics ). This system should be replicatable in any nation (so using parts that can be ordered/attained in any country)
* a open-design (micro)turbine
* a 2-door design (doors with mosquito netting, hence screens) to keep out mosquitoes. It's similar in operation as a cleanroom
* A page on practical oxyhydrogen production for energy purposes, and perhaps production of the other zero-emission fuels aswell (ie biohydrogen, methane, ...)
* a design for a AT pulse jet (+turbine), for incinerating fuels more efficiently in combination with a fuel-based (preferably) or steam-based turbine
* ...
[[Special:Contributions/91.182.198.222|91.182.198.222]] 10:47, 12 August 2012 (PDT), aka User:KVDP


:Re "the development of projects does not happen with a same pace as the development of articles." True.
:It's fine to share about things that are not open source, as long as the text is released under our open content license.  
:"In addition, we often have several similar projects (for example several designs of chicken coops, ...)." Also true - eventually I think we'd have categories for them - or else we'd manage this somehow with [[A:Semantic MediaWiki]].
:"I am thinking that projects are being worked out more rapidly as the wiki itself as students at Humboldt probably get points for their project design" - yes. Also at [[MTU]] and sometimes other universities - see [[:Category:Service learning]].
Also sometimes for articles - see [[:Category:JMC330 International Mass Communication]].
:"I think it may be beneficial that other people would suggest projects (and perhaps articles) that are more meaningful/useful in the intrest of our mission." I agree - it's a matter of how to do it. I've used the {{tl|sp}} tag to add ideas to [[:Category:Suggested projects]] (not very elegant, but it's the best I've managed to do within the wiki.) I don't think any of them have been taken up, but if we have a lot of students involved, looking for projects, more might happen. If we have a kind of advisory board making their suggestions for key areas to develop, that might get some more attention (in addition to community suggestions, of course).
:My conclusion is that we'd benefit from having a lot more classes involved. This is one of my goals, but I get sidetracked with doing day-to-day things on the wiki. I'm narrowing my focus, though, and I'll see what I can do in the next couple of months, together with anyone else interested in this. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 05:34, 20 August 2012 (PDT)


== Practical Plants ==
:I hope that helps! --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]])
Thanks, Chriswaterguy.  I will attempt to conform to these guidelines, and if I make any mistakes please let me know so I can correct them.  Thanks. --Joshua


Hello Appropedia community!
== Nominating Ethan for admin ==
I'd like to share with you the launch of a new semantic wiki for the permaculture community: [http://practicalplants.org Practical Plants].


It's an open (creative commons licensed) collaboratively edited plant encyclopedia and database, with a strong emphasis on practical horticulture. It currently covers: design functions, edible, material and medicinal uses, plant interactions (beneficial or detrimental), guilds/polycultures, ecosystem layer, cultivars and subspecies, problems & pests, crop harvest and storage, environmental tolerances & preferences, and of course propagation and cultivation information. We currently have over 7000 plant articles with full data from an import of the CC licensed PFAF database.  
[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] has been flagging spam, and being an admin would let him work on this more effectively. He's been an enthusiastic and trustworthy contributor here, so I see no reason not to make him an admin. Support, oppose or have another comment? Please comment below. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 06:20, 12 June 2015 (PDT)
:I'd be glad to help out. :) --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 19:35, 12 June 2015 (PDT)
:Support, [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 01:55, 24 June 2015 (PDT)
::Great. Thank you Ethan, welcome to adminship. You should see new tools on pages (such as the ability to delete directly). You should also see new tools at [[Special:SpecialPages]], such as mass delete (use with care). Please feel free to ask whenever you have a question. Thank you for all you do. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 17:58, 19 July 2015 (PDT)
:::Thanks everyone. I tried out the delete function on the lastest spam articles. What's the standard procedure for the spambot-created users? I'll take a closer look at [[Special:SpecialPages]]; there's a lot there. Any recommended regular mainenance tasks? --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 13:15, 31 July 2015 (PDT)


While I'm a keep permaculture practitioner, we chose to keep the scope to general organic agriculture to make it as accessible as possible to all interested in growing their own food with organic methods, but much of the data (eg. design functions, plant interactions, ecosystem layer) is of particular interest to practitioners of permaculture and agroforestry.
== Lightweight structural panels 3D print ==


I'm the web developer behind the project, so here's a bit of technical information for those of you interested (skip to the next paragraph otherwise!). It's built on Semantic MediaWiki just like Appropedia, making heavy use of Semantic Forms to make all articles edible without having to know a jot of wiki markup. All plant data is stored as semantic properties and so all plants are searchable by their properties (eg. filter for all plants which tolerate very acid soil and permanent shade). Furthermore, plants are interlinked to form an intricate web of relationships using semantic sub-objects and intermediary pages, allowing data and descriptive text to be stored about the link (eg. Plant A has a ''positive'' impact on Plant B because it is a ''pest confuser''). Polycultures/guilds are stored as articles in their own right, with property links to the plant articles.  
Think of a cross between milk crates and giant legos.  Now build a house with it.  If you're actively intrigued about how to address this challenge with a 3D printer, please see http://www.appropedia.org/Lightweight_structural_panels_3D_print  because I really don't know much about how to go about it. I only have an idea with potential.


I'm a big fan of the Appropedia mission - I'm a huge proponent of the freedom of information, which is the reason we set off on the mission to create Practical Plants earlier this year.
== top menu link for Community action ==


I'm interested in ways our projects can work together. Practical Plants has a very specific focus and as such there are times that plant data raises questions which are outside of the scope of Practical Plants to answer. Eg. We define terms like ''Nitrogen fixer'', ''Mineral accumulator'' etc, but we think it is outside of the scope of Practical Plants to discuss ''why'' these things are so important, what ''role'' they fulfil within an integrated permaculture system, etc. Likewise, the extremely specific functionality required to maintain a thorough plant database is hard to fit within a wiki with a much larger scope like Appropedia. I'd be very interested in exploring inter-wiki links and any forms of mutual co-operation you might have to propose.
Can we have a link in the menu that goes across the top of pages for Community action (as in the areas of the side bar)? I've moved 'Sustainable community action' to [[Community action for sustainability]], which fits better with the link, and is perhaps a slightly less opaque name (plus am making corresponding changes to category names, etc), Cheers, [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 08:21, 13 August 2015 (PDT)


Andru Vallance
Also would be good to have links to [[Community action for sustainability]] or [[Community action for sustainability|Community action]] on [[Welcome to Appropedia/Categories]] & [[Appropedia:CategoryTree]] [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 07:45, 16 August 2015 (PDT)
[http://practicalplants.org Practical Plants] and [http://cernunnos.es Cernunnos]


:Thanks Andru.
:I bet most-all of Category:[[Taking action]] could be merged into CAS, and then CAS could replace it on the Category Tree. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 11:40, 17 August 2015 (PDT)
:To update others - Andru & I have been emailing, and chatting on [[A:IRC|IRC]], about how we can work together. The Practical Plants wiki is a great effort - very nice looking, with Semantic MediaWiki. We know from experience that [[How to make a successful new wiki|making a successful new wiki]] is very hard, but Andru is placed better than most because he's obviously very technically competent, and passionate.
:As for working together, we discussed jointly approaching PFAF about using the more open CC-by-sa license, and I think we discussed interlinking. Both those make sense.
:"the extremely specific functionality required to maintain a thorough plant database is hard to fit within a wiki with a much larger scope like Appropedia" - could you explain what you mean, Andru? I see some cool technical features on your wiki, but I don't see anything that would cause a problem if implemented with our content.
:As we discussed, my own preference is to share skills and create a single wiki. Linking articles within a wiki is elegant - it's what wikis are meant to do, and a big wiki enables a wonderful ability to click from one interesting article to another, to another... Linking between wikis is not the same; also, there will inevitably be replication. I'm also not sure if it's realistic to have two wikis with a single community - I've never heard of such a thing. So I've laid my cards on the table, and it's something we can revisit down the track if appropriate, but we can start collaborating in other ways in the meantime.
:And it's after midnight here, so thank you again, and goodnight. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 07:46, 14 August 2012 (PDT)


::Hi Chris & The Appropedia Community,
== commercial article? ==
::Technically, there aren't any huge problems integrating something like Practical Plants into another wiki. I've developed a number of custom extensions to enable some of the functionality there, and it uses a huge number of semantic properties and templates to render articles, but these would only provide an inconvenience to maintain within a larger wiki, not a barrier.
::When I refer to the difficulties of maintaining a plants wiki-base within a larger wiki I'm referring to what I envision would be an organisacional difficulty and a lack of clarity over what something like Practical Plants is within a larger wiki. Practical Plants, for example, encourages through it's heavy use of forms a rigid article format. In many ways it is a wiki pretending to be a database. While users are able to use wikitext in form sections, they can only really append free-style wiki text to the end of the article. I think there could be a great deal of confusion in embedding a rigid database within a free-format wiki.
::Another important point for me is the branding. To attract the audience Practical Plants will require to build it, a separate and clearly defined identity is essential. It must be broad enough to attract gardeners of all types. I think this would be lost when embedded in another wiki. While there may be some cross over, I think there will be distinct contributors to broader sustainability/permaculture subjects and to plant articles. I believe we can attract an audience of contributors with the brand we have. I think it would be more difficult as a section of a more general wiki.
::I agree that the points you raised are potential benefits - a united community, easier inter-article linking, and so on. I believe, if we wanted to, there are ways those issues can be solved. For example, Practical Plants does not use the mediawiki userbase. I have created a Single-Sign-On (SSO) solution to share user accounts between our community forum, our wiki, and our blog. One account gives you access to all three pieces of software. I'm currently working on the ability for users to build points and achieve "roles" based on their contributions. Furthermore you can login via OpenID, Facebook, Google, etc... This could easily be extended to work with other wiki's, allowing a single community of users to edit multiple wikis and access a shared forum with a single account. It's certainly technologically feasible.
::I'm interested in exploring the idea of a future united sustainability/permaculture brand, providing a single-sign-on throughout a number of websites, and allowing navigation between them (eg. through a mast-head which resides above all sites).
::For now though, there are ways we could improve inter-wiki linking if desired. I could pen an extension, for example, which could provide a link with context on the receiving site (eg. a link from Appropedia > Practical Plants produces a bar which stays at the top or bottom of the browser pane with the message "You came here from Appropedia. Click here to return to ARTICLE NAME" and visa-versa. Furthermore, you could embed a subset of data from Practical Plants within a plant article on Appropedia with a "View more details on Practical Plants" link. At the moment, the license Practical Plants has for data doesn't allow this, but there are ways we can work on that as Chris stated.
::We don't want to push PFAF yet on license data. Practical Plants is very new and we'd like our initial relations with PFAF to be open and free of pressure. We'll leave that subject open for now to revisit in the near future.
::I'm interested in being involved in the ongoing development of the permaculture section of this wiki and finding ways which the two wiki's can co-operate and integrate both now and in the future. At present, I think it is in the best interests of Practical Plants to retain it's brand and separation of content.
::Thanks
::Andru


== "No ads" template - <nowiki>{{subst:no ads}}</nowiki>  ==
I'd like for someone to take a look at [[The Economics of UK's Residential Solar Power]] and tell me what you think about it. It's been written by, and links to, a website that compares different solarvoltaic installation services in the UK. I'm not sure whether this crosses a line in terms of advertising content. It does appear to offer some useful, if unsourced, information. I'm sure at least part of the motivation for creating the article was for SEO reasons, but I don't think that's sufficient reason to remove it if they're also adding substantive content to Appropedia. Thoughts? --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 11:52, 17 August 2015 (PDT)


There have been some advertising links on wastewater related pages occasionally e.g. [[Septic tanks]] and [[Wastewater treatment effluent]]. They're on topic, but they don't add anything useful to the page. I've gone through and check, and removed the ones without value, and on those two pages I've now added a hidden notice in the links section, visible when someone edits the page or section:
== Question on Naming Conventions ==


<nowiki><!-- NOTE: PLEASE DO NOT ADD LINKS UNLESS THEY CONTAIN USEFUL INFORMATION. </nowiki>
Was fleshing out an index on my new project page and wanted to ask about the naming conventions for internal page links. First, is it OK to use separate pages for sub-sections of a project or is it preferable to only use sub-sections on the one project page? Is there a convention for naming internal pages and links so they relate just to a parent project?
<nowiki>Commercial links will be promptly deleted *UNLESS* they contain useful information about the subject. --></nowiki>


To make it easier to add this, I've made a template, {{tl|no ads}}, which has the above message. But, IMPORTANT NOTE: it must be "substituted" in like so:
Thank you. {{unsigned|EricHunting|23 August 2015}}


<pre><nowiki>{{subst:no ads}}</nowiki></pre>
:My opinion is 1) Go for it. If it turns out there's not much substance on a particular page, it can easily be merged into the parent page. 2) Check out [[Help:Page naming]]. I would title the pages something like [[Open House Fabrication]], [[Open House Budget]] and so on. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 12:16, 23 August 2015 (PDT)


That will permanently change it from a template to the text itself. Otherwise the message won't be visible.
:Agree with Ethan. Unless they're short sections, it's often better to have separate pages, that link to each other.  


I hope that's useful. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 01:28, 15 August 2012 (PDT)
:Having the patent project as part of the pagename is a good idea, so visitors can quickly see what it's about. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 06:54, 24 August 2015 (PDT)


== Recent changes patrol - call for patrollers ==
:Thanks for the suggestions. I'll give that a try. --[[User:EricHunting|EricHunting]] ([[User talk:EricHunting|talk]]) 06:58, 25 August 2015 (PDT)


I've just posted [http://blogs.appropedia.org/2012/08/15/tools-for-wiki-spam-warriors/ Tools for wiki spam warriors] on the Appropedia Blog. Highlighted tools:
== Ekopedia status ==


''For admins'': A great and easy way to help is to keep an eye on the [[Special:NewestPages|'''NewestPages''']]. The spam articles are easy to spot by their titles. User pages need to be eyeballed.
It appears that Ekopedia is down. Are the site owners/ admins aware of the outage? --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 11:47, 27 August 2015 (PDT)


''For everyone'': Keep an eye on [http://www.appropedia.org/index.php?namespace=&tagfilter=n&title=Special%3ARecentChanges changes by new and anonymous users]. This is also good for spotting comments by visitors, difficulties faced by newbies, and good edits by newbies that we can say thanks for.
: Yes. There are people working hard on it. The technical details are quite difficult and they could use some additional help. Please contact [[User:Chriswaterguy]] if you know some great multilanguage wiki people that could help. In the mean time, I am making a temporary landing page at [[Ekopedia]]. Please feel free to edit with more direction. Thank you, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]])


''For IRC-using super-geeks'': [[User:Danny B.|Danny B.]] set up a [irc://chat.freenode.net/appropedia-rc real time recent changes channel on IRC] (that link might work if you have an IRC client installed - see [[A:IRC]] for help), and he's been deleting spam that he spots this way.
== A Two-Stage, Oscillating Swingset Pump  ==


''For me'': There's a spam filter which I maintain, checking and tweaking to ensure we keep blocking most of the spam before it hits the wiki, but avoid blocking good edits. If you notice any new patterns in the spam that's getting through, please let me know the details. I'm also happy to collaborate if someone else knows regex and wants to help write the filters.
By swinging in this 'swing/penduluum' the other end of the lever oscillates up and down.  


I'm cutting back my spam patrol hours to do meta-Appropedia work like the internship program and fundraiser that I've been wanting to work on - I'll only do the spam filter from now on, and trust that the community can mop up the spam that sneaks by the filter. Thanks! --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 05:16, 15 August 2012 (PDT)
This then operates a vertical rod which, with a simple piston air compressor (or water pump), stores compressed air in an insulated air scuba tank, or pumps water in an efficient and relaxing way.


== Appropedia manual of style ==
The heat from compression stays put, and gives more umPH to run two air pistons, which are located on-board the teeter-totter 'chariot'!  (Now stationary for water pumping.) 


I'd like to see a consistent way of formatting Appropedia, and it would be great if we could decide on a few issues. None of them are huge issues, but we need to decide one way or another.  
Then, off it goes with a thousand lb. load of goods to a destination. Truly a dual-purpose vehicle!


I know one source of inconsistency is that some of us are following Wikipedia standards based on their [[wikipedia:WP:Manual of style|Manual of style]], and others of us are following academic journal style guides. We won't resolve this in one discussion, but maybe we can start by discussing these few issues:
These two air pistons then power the wheels, to assist the runner/driver with getting easily around a festival area at 10mph cruising speed...with a thousand pounds of people!
* '''Titles - plural or singular?''': I pushed for plurals in the beginning, and that's become the default for some of us. But sometimes I think my original idea was daft. There are some words where the plural isn't obvious (E.g. is it technology, as an uncountable noun, or technologies?)
* '''Template names''': I use all lower case and don't run words together, which makes sense to me. If we do them all in one reasonably logical way, it'll be easier to remember when we go to use a template.
* '''Headers at the beginning of articles''', e.g. ''Introduction'', ''Background'', ''Definition'', ''Abstract'', or a header that's identical to the page title. I think the pages will be clearer if we remove these, and that would bring the first sentences closer to the top of the page (by dropping the table of contents lower down as well as by losing the header). But journal papers are required to have a header for the intro, I think. Thoughts? One idea: Avoid the headers and have an exception for journal articles (& drafts & submissions).
* '''Category tag placement''': Categories are usually placed at the end and I find that best and least distracting. Sometimes I see them at the top - am I going to offend anyone if I run a bot to move them all to the bottom?


Thoughts, suggestions? Even if you think "fine" or "don't care", leave a comment so I know you don't have objections. Thanks! --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 02:53, 11 September 2012 (PDT)
So, the penduluum , that is in the 'Two-Stage Oscillating Lever' invention, now becomes a...children's swing air compressor/water pump!  


:I've expanded on these at [[Appropedia:Manual of style‎]]. Please indulge my pedantry briefly, and comment there or on its talk page as appropriate. Consistency will make Appropedia more usable and more pleasant to use. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 01:39, 30 January 2013 (PST)
http://darinselby.1hwy.com/2stageswinglever03.html


==Portals and taskbar==
== Am I allowed to start pages in languages other than  English - Español - Deutsch - Français - Italiano - Português - Kiswahili ? ==
We need to make the wikipedia more simple to navigate.
see [[User_talk:Chriswaterguy#Portals_and_taskbar]] for some ideas
Let's discuss which things we can change, and against what there are objections.
[[User:KVDP|KVDP]] 00:34, 10 October 2012 (PDT)


== Appropedia Jam ==
I want to develop articles in my native tongue, to reach out the locals. This would also give a platform for my language writings to focus on green technology, green ways etc. So am I allowed to simply write articles in my language? [[User:IKHazarika|IKHazarika]] ([[User talk:IKHazarika|talk]]) 00:44, 16 September 2015 (PDT)


A bunch of us are getting together online in a few hours (and in real life, if you're in Arcata) for an [[A:Appropedia Jam|'''Appropedia Jam''']]. I'm really looking forward to it.
:Hi, IKHazarika. Yes, we welcome content in other languages. Please refer to [[Appropedia:Languages]]. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 02:08, 18 September 2015 (PDT)


See the [[A:Appropedia Jam|'''Appropedia Jam''']] page for details, and check the [http://www.worldtimebuddy.com/event?lid=0%2C5558953%2C5128581%2C2643743%2C160263%2C1642911%2C2147714%2C2179537&h=0&sts=22502880&sln=22-24&a=show time in your timezone] (e.g. 11 pm Sunday Oct 14 in London, 3pm US Pacific coast, 9am Mon 15th in Sydney).
== Duplicate originals ==


Two things we're still working on:
I've been going over the website with a fine-tooth comb looking for things that need to be cleaned up. Most issues I've found have trivial fixes, but here's one that's a little more complicated. Several original content pages dating back to 2006 have duplicate pages. In each case they have their own separate edit histories. See: http://www.appropedia.org/index.php?title=Special%3ASearch&search=%28original%29&fulltext=Search . Duplicates for each can be found as both [[XYZ_(original)]] and [[Original:XYZ]]. I'd be glad to merge these articles, if I can get some guidance on the best way to do that. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 22:05, 26 September 2015 (PDT)
* There's a countdown timer on that page, which hopefully will work properly - it seems to not update if you revisit the page, until you click the "refresh" link next to the countdown.
* We could do this regularly, but how about we have two times, and alternate between them? One month we do a time that's ideal for the US and Western Europe, the next month do one that's need to find a better time for other parts of the world. This time, 1am will be hard for [[User:Kili|Kili]] in Tanzania, and Monday morning isn't great for most of us in Australia and Asia! --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 20:28, 13 October 2012 (PDT)


== Talk page discussions ==
== Proposal for mass deletion ==


It's currently hard to know when someone's left a [http://www.appropedia.org/index.php?namespace=1&tagfilter=&days=30&title=Special%3ARecentChanges question or comment on a talk page] (or, more rarely, on a [http://www.appropedia.org/index.php?title=Special:RecentChanges&days=300&namespace=15 Category talk]/[http://www.appropedia.org/index.php?namespace=103&tagfilter=&days=300&title=Special%3ARecentChanges Original talk]/[http://www.appropedia.org/index.php?namespace=101&tagfilter=&days=300&title=Special%3ARecentChanges Portal talk] page). Let's make a section here for any discussions or questions that we find. Just add to the list, with or without a description of the question/discussion. (This is a stop-gap measure - I'm looking forward to getting an better solution.)  
There was a certain user who copied a lot of templates and other content over from Wikipedia about 2 1/2 years ago. Most to all of it seems to be unnecessary to Appropedia, at least at this stage in its development. For example, there are several templates related to news. While Philralph has been adding news to the relevant location pages on CAS pages, there's not multiple news stories coming up every day to make those templates usable. Also there's not a large enough userbase here to update them. Other templates are just outside of the purview of this wiki. Further, they're really cluttering up the category tree. Therefore, I'd like to go through and just get rid of the majority of it. There's probably a few things that might possibly be used in the future which could be shelved in the incubator, and I'm willing to go digging through it all. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 05:25, 30 September 2015 (PDT)
:I went ahead with this. There was at least one template that was deleted in error, so if anyone notices something that looks broken please inform me or another admin. I changed my mind about a news template (see below). --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 02:32, 2 December 2015 (PST)


Please respond to these discussions at the relevant page, and not here. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 05:21, 23 October 2012 (PDT)
== Porting from PermaWiki ==


* [[Talk:Safety of energy sources]] - a controversial article, but perhaps an important one. Delete it, or flag it as controversial and correct it?
I received Graham Burnett's blessing to port [[PermaWiki]]'s content here. He was actually surprised it hadn't been done already. Because of long-term interest in PermaWiki here, and both sites using [[CC-BY-SA]] I anticipate no roadblocks. I set up the infrastructure already; ported pages can be appended with '''<nowiki>{{attrib permawiki}}</nowiki>''', which will automatically place them in the PermaWiki category. The full list of mainspace pages can be found [http://permaculture.wikia.com/wiki/Special:AllPages here]. I'll get started on this in earnest once I finish porting the [[Permaculture.info]] content (shouldn't be long, once I resolve access issues). --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 09:44, 5 October 2015 (PDT)
* [[Talk:Agriculture]] - not a big issue, but do we call the article "Agriculture" or "Farming"?
* [[Talk:Greywater #Links]] - assessing which links to keep, which to delete.
* [[Talk:Mobile Solar Powered 3D Printer V2.0]]
* [[Talk:Windpumps]] - should our pagenames be plural or singular?
* [[Talk:Dew collection roof retrofit]] - using PVC for water collection?
* [[Talk:Animal husbandry]] - the [[Animal husbandry]] needs numbers and sources; raising wild species -> disagreement.
* [[Talk:Printable Breast Pump]] - what kind of warning is suitable (about the milk not being kept sterile)?
* [[Talk:Alternative society]] - suggestion to split up the [[Alternative society]] page.
* [[Original talk:Understanding Solar Stills]] - suggestion for increasing durability
* [[Talk:Population management]] - content removed from article, with comments (but layout is unclear).


== porting wikipedia templates ==
:Excellent, thank you! --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 18:12, 27 November 2015 (PST)


I have been porting a bunch of wikipedia templates over to get the nice table in the [[Arduino]] article. Tried to get the in to mm conversion working but getting errors -- if anyone that is more familiar with templates could have a look - it would be most appreciated. --[[User:J.M.Pearce|Joshua]] 19:18, 2 January 2013 (PST)
== OpenStreetMap ==


:The conversions appear to be working now. It just needed a few more templates. :-) --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 17:56, 12 March 2013 (PDT)
I'd like to propose a new feature: compatibility with OpenStreetMap. First, it's collaborative and open-licensed ([[CC-BY-SA]]), consistent with Appropedia. Second, (in my opinion) the map quality is often better than proprietary map services. More info here: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/MediaWiki_extension
--[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 20:19, 25 October 2015 (PDT)


== suggestion for appropedia collaboration effort for 2013 ==
:Hi Ethan,
:We are working on a site upgrade as we speak. Once we are up to date, I would love to explore this extension. I love OpenStreetMap. Thanks, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 20:01, 2 December 2015 (PST)


I have been talking to Chris about an idea I've had for a direction we might consider for 2013. I thought it might be useful for me to try to explain it here.
: [https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Wikivoyage:Mapmaking_Expedition Wikivoyage] has two types of map,  both derived from OSM. A "dynamic map" has OSM data overlaid with any WV listings (hotels, etc.) that include lat/long co-ords; almost every destination has one of these & there's a template to make inserting one easy. Some also have a "static map", user-created. [[User:Pashley|Pashley]] ([[User talk:Pashley|talk]]) 15:46, 17 February 2017 (PST)


I think it might be useful to collaborate to assess low-tech sanitation systems, particularly with regard to their effectiveness and safety.  There is a lot of technical information around the internet, but this is often hard to find and rarely subject to intense criticism.  If we could collate the information - particularly if we can encourage different experts to edit and discuss - I think his would be the start of an evidence-based toolkit for practitioners to understand interventions.  [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 06:57, 14 January 2013 (PST)
== Felicity Tepper for admin ==


:Thanks for the initiative, Joe.  
I nominate {{user|Felicity Tepper}} for an [[A:admins|admin]] role. Felicity has been making many valuable contributions and also tagging spam pages for deletion.  


:This fits with work that HSU is doing with Appropedia, under Lonny's direction. I'm sure they'll continue to contribute good info.
Felicity, do you accept? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]])


:From my experience, the way to really get Appropedia growing in a particular area is to recruit an academic to [[A:SL|using Appropedia with their class]]. A focus on critical thinking and assessment will certainly appeal to some instructors - as well as being the right direction for Appropedia, IMO. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 02:57, 6 February 2013 (PST)
:I've been reading through the admin materials and links, to be sure of the responsibilities involved. If everyone else is happy for me to facilitate in this way, then I'd be happy to accept. [[User:Felicity Tepper|Felicity]] ([[User talk:Felicity Tepper|talk]]) 13:20, 28 November 2015 (PST)


::I really like this idea and love the work that [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] has been doing already. I will be on the look out for a teacher/class or business that would be into this and would love to hear ideas from Joe. thanks, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] 18:47, 12 February 2013 (PST)
Any words of support, any questions or concerns? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 18:09, 27 November 2015 (PST)
:I support! --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 18:24, 27 November 2015 (PST)


== Requsting main page redesign ==
:Me too! [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 02:42, 28 November 2015 (PST)


Hi I have created [[Appropedia:User experience/MainPageRedesign5]] to test out a new look for the main page I would like to include it in the main page please it has a new disgn and some more information added to it and I would like to also ask could this website have a minor disgn change by adding the serve bar to the top of the website and suggest coming down from when your typing please and would like you to make this website other available languages and could you allow people by putting for example in an article [[en:]] or [[fr:]] to link it to the languages available to that article just like Wikipedia does please [[User:User555|User555]] 16:17, 12 February 2013 (PST)
:Support. Felicity has been adding a lot of great content and tagging spam. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 17:31, 28 November 2015 (PST)


:Hi User555
::Woohoo. Thank you [[User:Felicity Tepper|Felicity]], you are now an [[A:admins|admin]]! --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 19:41, 1 December 2015 (PST)
:Thank you for all your work on templates and the main page update. There a few easy items left to change there, e.g. the links to recent deaths and news shouldn't be there, the portals should link to actual portals, and a section for announcements is probably still needed.
:Regarding a serve bar... i am not sure what you are referring to
:Regarding separate languages the way wikipedia does it... we hope to have that complete in less than one month
:Thanks again, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] 18:43, 12 February 2013 (PST)


::hi I have done a minor change to it I have added announcements I have also created in the news [[User:User555|User555]] 01:07, 13 February 2013 (PST)
Thanks everyone, looking forward to helping out and continuing to learn. Cheers. [[User:Felicity Tepper|Felicity]] ([[User talk:Felicity Tepper|talk]]) 23:03, 1 December 2015 (PST)


::: Hi. I am sorry, I think we have a misunderstanding. I will try to be more clear:
== Main page redesign proposal ==
:::* There should not be a section for news.
:::* The section for announcements looks great.
:::* The portals in the header should lead to actual [[Portal:List_of_portals|portals]].
::: Does that make more sense?
::: Thank you, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] 21:15, 13 February 2013 (PST)
::::yes I have removed in the news now I am just creating the portals and then the page will be finish thanks for telling me [[User:User555|User555]] 08:16, 14 February 2013 (PST)
:::::hi do you mean for announcements to create it side bar like what I did in the new should I put announcements where in the new use to be before I removed [[User:User555|User555]] 08:18, 14 February 2013 (PST)


::::::I have created the portals  [[User:User555|User555]] 06:29, 15 February 2013 (PST)
I'd like to suggest some design changes for the front page. My draft redesign is [[User:Ethan/Main|here]]. There's two main things I'd like to see:  


::::::::it is now ready [[User:User555|User555]] 03:15, 16 February 2013 (PST)
1) Reduce size of header and announcements. Right now when I load the main page these two items take up all of the space that isn't dedicated to the top & side bars. I'm not very experienced in graphic design, but to my mind that's a waste of some valuable real estate.


{{undent}} Thanks User555. I love the idea of having these new sections - "did you know", featured pictures - and when we have content ready for these sections, I'd like to roll them out. Now, this will take some work... how do we take the first steps? (I even like the idea of a news section, and once we get a few communications classes working on Appropedia, we'll be ready to look at that, I think.)-[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 17:46, 20 February 2013 (PST)
2) Add a news section. Phil has been adding news items to [[Community action for sustainability]] on a daily basis. I think bringing them to the front page, and putting them next to the more static content on the front page offers a nice balance. It would do a better job of highlighting the breadth and depth of material covered on Appropedia.  


:ok [[User:User555|User555]] 13:20, 23 February 2013 (PST)
I think both of these would spur more interest and participation from visitors to the site. Note that my draft has some issues: the left and right columns can become unaligned depending on what which random selections load. The Highlighted Projects section would also need to be edited to fit the left column. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 21:34, 29 November 2015 (PST)


== Site redesign ==
:I'd love to see a redesign. I'll have a closer look at your draft later (getting to work now) but:
:* The part of the header that lists all the topic areas ("Appropriate technology • Construction • " etc) was an experiment, I think, and it isn't necessary as we have sidebar navigation and a search bar. We can remove it and see how that goes. In fact... {{done}}! (If that turns out to be unpopular, any admin can revert, here: [[MediaWiki:Sitenotice]].)
:* News section would be excellent - the continual activity that's been happening on Appropedia means that we can keep that fresh.
:Thanks! --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 14:42, 30 November 2015 (PST)


Hi I would like to suggest several new features and disgn changes I would like to sea please
:This is looking good. Is there any way to bring the highlighted project higher. I feel like projects are the core of Appropedia and it would be cool to have it above the fold. Either way, I think it looks better as you have it and would be happy have you implement it. Eventually we will have staff for some awesome UX. In the mean time, I am glad that we can all make it better. While you are at it, can you:
1. I would like more languages for example website address change to www.en.appropedia.org - for English or www.fr.appropedia.org for the French version of here simpler to Wikipedia address but in stead of saying Wikipedia it would say appropedia
*get rid of the links to friendfeed, identi.ca, and delicious at the bottom.
*add Pinterest - https://www.pinterest.com/appropedia/.
**{{done}} --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] ([[User talk:RichardF|talk]]) 07:06, 2 December 2015 (PST)
:Thanks! --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 18:24, 30 November 2015 (PST)


2. I would like it to be easer to search this website for example please out the search bar at the top with suggestion popping down please and I would like this website to support <pre> <div></div> </pre> tags please
I don't see a big conceptual difference between "Community action news" and "Hot topics / In the news." Perhaps the items can be combined into one section or one section with two parts. I put together a sample layout --> [[User:RichardF/Sandbox|here]] <-- to show how "Community action news" could be incorporated into the Main Page, while still keeping the "Highlighted project" near the top. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] ([[User talk:RichardF|talk]]) 06:43, 2 December 2015 (PST)


3. I would like to see support for link the article to other pages in different languages please for example I would like to do [[en:example]] or [[fr:example]] so it links to that page but in different languages please
:Hot Topics/In The News is more focused on the work of Appropedians, while Community Action News focuses on the work people are doing in communities around the world. Hot Topics/In The News is closer in content to the Appropedia blog. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 01:02, 4 December 2015 (PST)


4. I would like to sea in version history the option to revert the edits please and I would like to sea a new updated screen in show changes so it show a white back and show what words you change and what words you've added and I would like to see in history is how many letter you've added simpler to Wikipedia like if you added more it would show + how many you've or if you taken away it would says - how many
::That sounds like a reason to keep them distinct but not necessarily separate in general locations on the page. If you all need any more help with page layouts, let me know. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] ([[User talk:RichardF|talk]]) 06:41, 4 December 2015 (PST)


[[User:User555|User555]] 13:06, 13 February 2013 (PST)
Hi all, it'd be good to take up [[User:Ethan|Ethan]]'s suggestion of getting some Community Action News into the main page. [[User:RichardF|RichardF]]'s general locations on the page looks good to me, but there seemed too much text on one band (row). A way round this might be to incorporate Selected Quote into one of the columns (for me adds to readability) example [[User:Philralph/sandbox|here]]. What do you all think? [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 10:52, 7 January 2016 (PST)
*{{done}} --[[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 08:26, 20 January 2016 (PST)


:We are currently updating the version of mediawiki and adding language support. I hope you will like the changes which will take place this month. Thanks, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] 21:36, 13 February 2013 (PST)
== Nominating Philralph for admin ==


::ok thank you [[User:User555|User555]] 02:09, 14 February 2013 (PST)
I nominate {{user|Philralph}} for an [[A:admins|admin]] role. Philralph has been very active, especially in building the many, many pages on sustainable community action..


:::could you also change the design and make the design moder simler to Wikipedias but different please [[User:User555|User555]] 06:17, 15 February 2013 (PST)
Philralph, do you accept? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]])


:::: We have a version of the Vector skin, adapted from Wikipedia (thanks [[User:RichardF]]) but we need help to get the Facebook and Google Plus buttons to work. Do you know someone who can help with the CSS? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 18:03, 20 February 2013 (PST)
::Yes, thank you --[[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 07:16, 2 December 2015 (PST)


:::: no not really I will look online and find on how to use codes to input Facebook and google bottom [[Special:Contributions/86.173.149.162|86.173.149.162]] 11:06, 23 February 2013 (PST)
:I second that nomination! --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 19:46, 1 December 2015 (PST)
:Absolutely! I thought he was already! [[User:Felicity Tepper|Felicity]] ([[User talk:Felicity Tepper|talk]]) 23:04, 1 December 2015 (PST)
::I, too, was surprised when I realized he wasn't. I '''support''', of course. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 02:16, 2 December 2015 (PST)


:::::I have created facebook twitter and other buttons [[User:User555|User555]] 14:51, 23 February 2013 (PST)
:::Hi Phil,
:::Congratulations and thank you! You are now an [[A:admins|admin]]. Please see the fledgling [[Appropedia:Guidelines for administrators]] for more info. There should be more tools available to all the admins at [[Special:SpecialPages]] as well. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 19:56, 2 December 2015 (PST)


::::Thanks all --[[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 23:53, 2 December 2015 (PST)


<big>hi I have change the portals I created and replaced them with the ones created on here </big> [[User:User555|User555]] 08:50, 9 March 2013 (PST)
== Feedback on support page please. (New recurring donation option.) ==


== Suggestion for creating projects  ==
Please check our donate page, clicking from the left sidebar: Support -> Donate. (I'm not linking it here - too easy for someone to insert scam or phishing links in a wiki page.)


I have a suggestion how about we create a project on here for each things sillier to wikipedia called WikiProject. We could create one for improving the main page. Another one could be for creating or improving a page or many more [[User:User555|User555]] 13:25, 15 February 2013 (PST)
I've added a recurring donation option. The page now needs a couple of things, and I'd love suggestions:
* A small number of engaging images from the wiki, illustrating a range of what we do - e.g. energy, water, building.  
* More engaging text, for a diversity of potential donors.


:I agree in principle. The challenge here is the smaller (so far) community.  From my experience in trying such things, I suggest:
Thanks! --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 14:56, 6 December 2015 (PST)
:* Keep it simple
:* Choose a logical discussion "hub" page for a given project. E.g. I suggest [[Appropedia:User experience]] for working on the main page and its [[Appropedia talk:User experience| talk page]] for discussion.
:* Let us know here. Assuming we're on the same wavelength, we can work together and make sure it's linked from the right places, and that the right people know about it (i.e. keen Appropedians working in that area).
:What do you think? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 19:16, 20 February 2013 (PST)
::yep [[User:User555|User555]] 11:07, 23 February 2013 (PST)


== Google+ ==
:Hi Chris, some pics from CASwiki, which could be balanced by pics of other stuff e.g. energy, water, building, etc:
<gallery>
File:Vélo parade - Vélorution - bike critical mass.JPG
File:2009 BrooksPark SanFrancisco 3899032980.jpg
File:KOCIS Korea Jongno Tree 09 (8633200009).jpg
File:South Carolina 1.jpg
File:Maza Wanawake Kwanza Growers Association (1).jpg
</gallery>


Could you create an account on google+ please [[User:User555|User555]] 12:33, 23 February 2013 (PST)
:[[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 09:31, 11 December 2015 (PST)


:We have a page there - [https://plus.google.com/113686496771245556609#113686496771245556609/posts Appropedia on G+] - is that what you mean? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 20:25, 23 February 2013 (PST)
::Thanks Phil.
::Since I posted, I had the thought that I should use images that are public domain or that we have copyright for, so we can just have the images, without attribution links. Donation pages shouldn't have unneeded links, which are opportunities for the reader to get distracted before donating :-). Anyway, I'll look for public domain images - but we could use these images elsewhere. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 16:53, 12 December 2015 (PST)


::ok thanks [[Special:Contributions/90.222.250.124|90.222.250.124]] 11:10, 8 March 2013 (PST)
== CC-BY-SA logo links to GNU FDL license ==


== Joeturner for admin ==
Just thought I'd point out that the CC-BY-SA logo at the bottom right corner of each page links to the GNU FDL license instead of the CC license. --[[User:Hairless Wookie|Hairless Wookie]] ([[User talk:Hairless Wookie|talk]]) 01:00, 7 January 2016 (PST)


I nominate User:Joeturner -- lots of good edits and spam fighting - would be more efficient to have him go at the spammers directly. -- Joshua 03:56, 26 February 2013 (PST)
:Woops – thanks!  
:Happy to help in any way I can with the spam.  Is it always this bad?  [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 07:02, 28 February 2013 (PST)
:: I second that nomination. It is not always bad. It is a consistent battle and we slowly adapt. So the spam gets worse for a while until we figure out how to stop that method and it quiets for a while... then the cycle starts again. Thanks! --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] 16:48, 1 March 2013 (PST)
::: Supported. See more at [[Appropedia:Administrators/Nominations#Joe_Turner]]. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] 15:12, 8 March 2013 (PST)
::::Excellent -  welcome to adminship,  Joe! --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 19:12, 8 March 2013 (PST)


== Anti-spam measures ==
:Note for a tech admin: The guide to editing the footer is at [[mw:Manual:Footer]]. I guess we're still on [http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ CC Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported], but just FYI there is now [http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ CC Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International] (but I haven't read up on the significance of the update). --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 03:45, 7 January 2016 (PST)


It looks like this wiki has spam trouble. Perhaps one of the admins should try this: http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:Asirra
== Tool for converting formatted text to wiki markup ==


(ConfirmEdit is more "official" but it looks like most spam bots can now bypass it.)
For those that aren't aware, we have a tool here which is useful if you have a document or web page that you are converting to a wiki page. (Of course, be sure that you have permission, and give attribution as appropriate).


:Lonny and [[User:Sam Rose]] are currently doing a big upgrade - after that I reckon it's time to look at Asirra and its super spam-fighting  kittens. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 19:21, 8 March 2013 (PST)
The tool: [http://www.appropedia.org/index.php?title=Appropedia:Wikedbox&action=edit Wikedbox]. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 04:32, 8 January 2016 (PST)


== Editing Wikipedia entry on the open source movement ==
== A few things noticed since the update ==


I'm just getting into it but I think the open source movement is so much more than software. Examples abound on this site!?! I may get around to editing the Wikipedia entry but I thought I'd put it out there in case anyone else wants to do it.
I wanted to mention a few things this non-techie editor has noticed since the site was updated:


Incidentally, studying openness, technology and media through the #ETMOOC right now. Check it out!
*I often see what I think are the announcements at the bottom of the front page, misaligned and where they shouldn’t be. I can upload a screenshot if nobody else is seeing this.
Natalie
*The blog section on the front page appears to be blank.
*I can’t access Special Pages at all. When I go to http://www.appropedia.org/Special:SpecialPages and click on any of these pages, the response I get is this: The following data is cached and may not be up to date. A maximum of 1,000 results are available in the cache.  There are no results for this report.  
*As I add categories to uncategorised articles, the total article count seems to be going backwards. I am not sure why this is happening.


== Bot ==
I thought I’d best pass these things on. Thanks for considering them. [[User:Felicity Tepper|Felicity]] ([[User talk:Felicity Tepper|talk]]) 02:02, 12 January 2016 (PST)


Hi could someone create a bot to copy from en wikipedia and put the content in to here please [[Appropedia:Selected anniversaries]] so the bot will copy from each date on en wikipedia and put it on to [[Appropedia:Selected anniversaries]] day it is today it is for the new main pag eo am creating in [[Appropedia:User experience/MainPageRedesign5]] [[Special:Contributions/86.173.149.162|86.173.149.162]] 13:01, 6 March 2013 (PST)
:Whoa – thank you for noticing those changes, and letting us know. I'm not in charge of tech things, but we do have a developer doing a few things. Let's see what Lonny says. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 05:58, 12 January 2016 (PST)


:Currently [[Appropedia:Selected anniversaries]] seems to be a mess of stuff. In addition, I am fairly concerned about the changing of templates which has been causing problems. I would like to caution care in changing existing template. What is the purpose of [[Appropedia:Selected anniversaries]] and will the page be fixed? Thank you! --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] 15:03, 8 March 2013 (PST)
:Thanks Chris, happy that it's on the radar. [[User:Felicity Tepper|Felicity]] ([[User talk:Felicity Tepper|talk]]) 00:40, 13 January 2016 (PST)


::the page is for the new main page redisgn [[Appropedia:User experience/MainPageRedesign5]] [[User:User555|User555]] 03:59, 9 March 2013 (PST)
:: Felicity's points 1&2 are the same bug. The blog section list doesn't conform to proper formatting. I'm guessing it's a conflict of the new CSS with JS. The weird thing is sometimes if you reload it *does* format correctly. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 21:27, 21 February 2016 (PST)
:: This falls under "feature, not a bug": since the update any page you edit will have the watch box checked (ticked) by default. Can we turn that off? --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 19:43, 25 February 2016 (PST)


:::OK, so are you going to fix it? [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 01:43, 13 March 2013 (PDT)
== Appropedia in Google's definitions boxes! Conventional farming needs work ==


== User555 for admin ==
If you search for ''how to measure stream flow'' or ''conventional farming'' on Google, the definition box now comes from Appropedia. Confirmed in multiple countries. Great stuff... except that our [[conventional farming]] isn't as good as it could be.
I nominate [[User:User555]] he has made lot of good edit as seen at [[Appropedia:User experience/MainPageRedesign5]] he has made lot of templates which are needed on here for example he changed the design of [[template:documentation]] check [[http://www.appropedia.org/index.php?title=Special:Contributions&limit=500&target=User555 User555 contribution]] to see his contribution here [[User:User555|User555]] 16:25, 23 February 2013 (PST)


== A new Main Page section – Selected categories ==
(Thanks to [[User:Lonny|Lonny]] for discovering this!) --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 14:47, 31 January 2016 (PST)


I added a new section to the Main Page, called Selected categories.  It’s near the bottom of the page. It includes categories for all of the Areas shown in the Navigation panel on the left side of every page plus the top-level content category, Topics.
: Nice to learn this, thanks for the update. It's great to learn about increasing traction and responsiveness, keep up the great work everyone. :) [[User:Felicity Tepper|Felicity]] ([[User talk:Felicity Tepper|talk]]) 02:37, 2 February 2016 (PST)


Because this section uses category trees, you can click on the [+] character next to any category and see all of its subcategories, as far down as they go.  This makes it possible to browse the wide variety of content areas available on Appropedia without having to leave the Main Page.
== permaculture content ready for "prime time"? ==


Please let me know if you have any feedback about this new section. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 08:07, 9 March 2013 (PST)
I was going to wait until I finished porting content from [[PermaWiki]] to do this, but there was a recent [https://www.reddit.com/r/Permaculture/comments/46473m/if_you_dont_want_open_source_permaculture_fuck_you/ heated conversation] about open-source permaculture. I was a little disappointed that our broadest permaculture pages didn't get mentioned, though some other sections of Appropedia were referenced. So I went ahead and added permaculture to the main page header, the sidebar and the main page selected portals (which may need to wait for a cronjob or cache refresh to appear?). I hope to raise the profile of Appropedia as permaculture wiki, because it is the only active one out there (also the Appropedia Foundation is a more trustworthy steward of this information than Wikia). If anyone objects, we can reverse these changes. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 21:38, 27 February 2016 (PST)


== Appropedia theme  ==
:Thanks Ethan, looks good.
:We have a number of great content areas, so I'm wondering how best dto display it all... might be something to ask a MediaWiki-friendly web designer. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 06:16, 12 March 2016 (PST)


Hi could you change the theme to vector please and could you change the default skin to vector please
== Support needed to keep Appropedia alive and kicking goals ==  
&useskin=vector
[[User:User555|User555]] 08:43, 9 March 2013 (PST)
:We haven't got a solution for the social media buttons yet. You posted something about this, but I couldn't understand what you meant. Do you have a way to make the the FB "Like" & G+ "+1" buttons work? --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 19:32, 9 March 2013 (PST)


Well I can hyperlink Facebook button like I did in the redisgn main page [[User:User555|User555]] 00:52, 10 March 2013 (PST)
I've worked out how to let people make a recurring monthly donation to the Appropedia Foundation, to keep Appropedia growing and doing awesome things. If you're in a position to support us, please click "[http://blogs.appropedia.org/support-appropedia Donate]" in the sidebar. Thanks! --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 18:29, 16 March 2016 (PDT)


Hi could you change the theme to vector please and could you change the default skin to vector please &useskin=vector [[User:User555|User555]] 00:52, 10 March 2013 (PST)
:Are Appropedia Foundation accounts available somewhere? Would it be possible to have a direct link to them from the "[http://blogs.appropedia.org/support-appropedia Donate]" page? [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 02:20, 18 March 2016 (PDT)


:Howdy,
::No, but I'd support making them available. Maybe we need to look at equivalent organisations (e.g. the Wikimedia Foundation) to help us with out whether there are particular things we need to keep confidential. I'm neither a lawyer nor an accountant.
:We plan on updating the skin as soon as the sitewide mediawiki upgrade is done, hopefully in the next few days. Thank you, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] 18:39, 13 March 2013 (PDT)
:::I'll pass this suggestion on to the board. Thanks. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ([[User talk:Chriswaterguy|talk]]) 04:34, 18 March 2016 (PDT)
::thanks [[User:User555|User555]] 09:22, 19 March 2013 (PDT)
::::'''Donation error''' PayPal has told me twice:
<code>Sorry — your last action could not be completed
Error Message


== Forums ==
Your request failed due to technical difficulties.Please try again after some time.</code>
::::Just so you know. [[User:Koavf|Koavf]] ([[User talk:Koavf|talk]]) 16:20, 3 July 2016 (PDT)


Hi I am in the middle of creating a template which allows you to create a form for example
Following on from my earlier comments: could Appropedia make use of [https://opencollective.com/ open collective]? - "A group of people with a shared mission that operates in full transparency"? Might this sort of thing be useful even if used to meet some, not necessarily all, of Appropedia's objectives, at first? [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 10:49, 19 April 2017 (PDT)


{{Forum
:for more see eg: Open Collectives: transforming our cities from the bottom-up, Apr 11: [http://magazine.ouishare.net/2017/04/open-collectives-transforming-our-cities-from-the-bottom-up/ @OuiShare] and [http://brusselstogether.org/ BrusselsTogether], "lets you create a virtual association so that you can get started in no time and focus on what you want to do to improve Brussels" - though there may be better examples in the context of Appropedia, [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 11:10, 19 April 2017 (PDT)
| name = Forum
 
| image =
== New related wiki ==
| caption =
 
| first name = user
'''Waterpedia''' See https://waterpedia.wiki/wpw/index.php/Waterpedia:About I figured this community and that one can work together. [[User:Koavf|Koavf]] ([[User talk:Koavf|talk]]) 16:15, 3 July 2016 (PDT)
| last name = 555
 
}}
== Ekopedia down ==
 
I am in the middle of adding more but I have added first name and last name I am adding more
'''See [http://ekopedia.org/ here]''' I get a 404 message:
<code>
 
Page not found (404)
Request Method: GET
Request URL: http://ekopedia.org/
 
Using the URLconf defined in odc.urls, Django tried these URL patterns, in this order:
 
    ^admin/
    ^odc/(?P<url>.*)/$ [name='odc']
    ^_odc/(?P<url>.*)/$ [name='odc']
    ^__odc/(?P<url>.*)/$ [name='odc']
    ^bloquery_post/ [name='bloquery_post']
    ^fiches/$
    ^vol/(?P<ht>.+)/$ [name='vol']
    ^vol2/$ [name='vol2']
    ^show/(?P<mo>.+)/$ [name='show']
    ^show_all/(?P<mo>.+)/$ [name='show_all']
    ^templ/(?P<mo>.+)/$ [name='templ']
    ^mod/(w{0,50}) [name='mod']
    ^web_editor/attachment/add/$ [name='docs']
    ^web/dataset/call_kwx$ [name='docs']
    ^website/
    ^theme_enark/
    ^web/
    ^web_editor/
    ^builder/
    ^theme_common/
    ^docs_list/$ [name='docs_list']
    ^docs_upload/$ [name='doc_add_form']
    ^doc_erase/(?P<name>.*)/$ [name='doc_erase']
    ^static/website/translations/$ [name='noslash']
    ^(?P<url>.*)/$ [name='url']
    ^media\/(?P<path>.*)$
 
The current URL, , didn't match any of these.
 
You're seeing this error because you have DEBUG = True in your Django settings file. Change that to False, and Django will display a standard 404 page.
</code>
Does anyone know what's up? The same thing happens at en.ekopedia. [[User:Koavf|Koavf]] ([[User talk:Koavf|talk]]) 20:42, 10 July 2016 (PDT)
: The Ekopedia and Appropedia teams are working together on the problem, but could use more help from people experienced in database and wiki management. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 23:06, 21 July 2016 (PDT)
 
== Spam and Captchas ==
 
Hello Intrepid Appropedians!
 
Thank you for your patience with our Captchas recently. We know that they had become too arduous and buggy. We have upgraded our captcha based spam abatement significantly. We hope your experience is also significantly enhanced! Please let us know if you have any problems editing, joining, posting, etc.
 
Thanks again, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 15:05, 21 September 2016 (PDT)
:Great job! Very minimal spam is making it through now. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 22:48, 25 February 2017 (PST)
 
== Saying Hi ==
 
Hi just introducing myself. I have some years experience on Wikipedia, here I'm interested in studying and working on many topics related to off grid + self sufficient homesteading. If anyone wants to collaborate on such topics let me know. Peace. [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 10:14, 17 February 2017 (PST)
 
:Hi Moribund,
:Great to meet you. Thanks for your contributions!
:--[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 11:24, 17 February 2017 (PST)
 
::Welcome Moribund. Please do share your knowledge and let us know if you've any questions. Your interests are perfect for here. [[User:Felicity Tepper|Felicity]] ([[User talk:Felicity Tepper|talk]]) 15:13, 17 February 2017 (PST)
 
::Welcome! Good contributions so far. Nice to have someone who's experienced with natural construction. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 00:24, 20 February 2017 (PST)
:::Hi all and thanks for welcome. Unfortunately no practical experience of natural construction, but this should change soon =)
:::Let me know if anyone wants to collaborate on any topics. [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 14:53, 22 February 2017 (PST)
 
== Appropriateness ==
 
One area on this wiki that could really use some development is [[appropriate]]ness. I don't fault Appropedia for not elaborating it clearly, since this is a wider issue in the permaculture, alternative building and possibly also the appropriate tech communities. I'm sure we can all think of instances of people becoming enamored with a certain technique or technology without giving due consideration to how well it would fit into the specific contexts. What I propose we do:
# Further develop the general notion of appropriateness across all sustainability disciplines. The [[context]] article is a good start.
# Note the in/appropriateness of specific techs in various contexts, including possible modifications. Perhaps we should add a recurring section for context considerations to specific tech articles.
--[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 20:01, 25 February 2017 (PST)
I should add that this information/ approach permeates Appropedia. What I'd like to do it bring it to the fore. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 20:10, 25 February 2017 (PST)
 
:Thank you Ethan. I appreciate your points and vision. I think that it is a common problem, at least for me, to forget to bring to the forefront the water in which we swim. I am excited to see your efforts in this direction!
:PS Some day, I would like to build some Human Centered Design content and make the connection between empathy and appropriateness.
:Thanks again, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 22:05, 25 February 2017 (PST)
 
== Fab labs ==
 
An intriguing new model of production. Anyone encountered one of these yet?
 
https://www.reddit.com/r/Permaculture/comments/6eb8hy/i_want_to_introduce_you_all_to_an_emerging_idea/
<small>—The preceding [[Help:Signatures|comment]] was added by [[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]] • [[Special:Contributions/Ethan|contribs]])  04:57, 1 June 2017‎ </small>
 
:Hi Ethan, I love fab labs and have contacts with a few engaged fab lab'ers over the past decade. Definitely cool. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 12:01, 16 June 2017 (PDT)


If you go here [[Template:Forum]] you can help I am using inforbox  [[User:User555|User555]] 11:31, 9 March 2013 (PST)
== RAIN archive ==


:I'm sorry, I don't understand the rationale behind the changes you are making. Why do you think we need a form?  I can't think of any good reason why we need that template on Appropedia. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 06:15, 10 March 2013 (PDT)
A digital archive of back issues of RAIN magazine is now available here: http://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/rain_japt/
--[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 22:52, 13 June 2017 (PDT)


:Further to the above, I have temporarily blocked User555 for 24 hours due to excessive importing of templates and other structural elements.  I have asked that User555 explains on a new page why additional changes are necessary and an improvement on the existing structure '''before''' making further changes.  These changes are too many and too fast and User555 has not been checking the effects of the changes, leading to considerable extra work to fix broken elements of Appropedia. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 06:46, 10 March 2013 (PDT)
:So cool! --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 12:02, 16 June 2017 (PDT)


::I expect the edits from [http://www.appropedia.org/Special:Contributions/90.222.250.124 90.222.250.124],  [http://www.appropedia.org/Special:Contributions/86.173.149.162 86.173.149.162] and [http://www.appropedia.org/Special:Contributions/46.45.182.142 46.45.182.142] are by this user as well.
== Quote and Cite templates ==
--[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 09:41, 10 March 2013 (PDT)
::The edits from [http://www.appropedia.org/Special:Contributions/46.45.182.142 46.45.182.142] occurred after the user was blocked. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 10:45, 10 March 2013 (PDT)
::: OK User555, how about you discuss with RichardF any other changes you are planning to make, otherwise I'll just go behind you reverting everything you do? [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 12:13, 10 March 2013 (PDT)


::::Someone requested someone to create it in one of the archive in village pump [[User:User555|User555]] 15:01, 11 March 2013 (PDT)
I think it would be useful to have these ''same'' templates:


== Daily Appropedia News ==
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Quote
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Cite_web
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Cite_book
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:Cite_journal


Hi could I create a page called [[Daily Appropedia News]] please it will have news from Appropedia and also news around the world please [[User:User555|User555]] 13:05, 13 March 2013 (PDT)
How to transfer:


:The Main Page already has a section called, "Hot topics / In the news."  Based on the ''very'' low turnover in this section, I see no evidence for the need to create a daily version of noteworthy Appropedia-related news items. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 16:07, 13 March 2013 (PDT)
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Templates#Copying_from_one_wiki_to_another


::could I create a seprate section for in the news on [[Appropedia:User experience/MainPageRedesign5]] please [[User:User555|User555]] 00:36, 14 March 2013 (PDT)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Export


:::Trying out things on a test page like that is fine with me. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 04:49, 14 March 2013 (PDT)
In testing it took a minute or two for wikipedia to prepare the Template:Quote.
It's 22.8 mb with all the history.


::::ok thankyou [[User:User555|User555]] 09:21, 14 March 2013 (PDT)
[[User:Facilitator|Facilitator]] ([[User talk:Facilitator|talk]]) 14:45, 18 September 2017 (PDT)


:::::Can you explain to me how your daily news page will work?  where is the content going to come from? [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 09:36, 15 March 2013 (PDT)
:Hi Facilitator, My apologies on the slow reply. Is this something you are still looking into? --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 11:45, 1 November 2017 (PDT)


:::::well first I will copy it from wiki news then I will change some things around and how the content is shown [[User:User555|User555]] 12:43, 15 March 2013 (PDT)
== Database Dumps are Empty ==
::::: so you will be doing that every day from now until... whenever..? I really do not think we need this. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 13:17, 15 March 2013 (PDT)
::::::well I am not copy every page from Wikinews only the main page [[User:User555|User555]] 09:28, 16 March 2013 (PDT)
::::::: why?  what value is it? who is going to copy the wikinews pages when you are not here? [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 09:40, 17 March 2013 (PDT)
::::::::I doint know but I will change a few things on it [[User:User555|User555]] 09:23, 19 March 2013 (PDT)


== Youtube vids ==
[[Appropedia:Current_dump]] hosts [http://www.appropedia.org/approbackups/currentdump.xml.gz currentdump.xml.gz]. This file is supposed to be a complete dump of the text of Appropedia, which is useful for offline browsing. For weeks (and maybe longer), the file has been just 20 bytes - an empty archive file with no content. Can somebody look into fixing this?


KVDP and I disagree on the value of video embeds. I think videos are a useful addition to pages, and sometimes explain subjects in a much better way than the text.  KVDP thinks they slow down the loading of pages.  Anyone else have any thoughts? [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 13:22, 13 March 2013 (PDT)
:We would love help on this. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 12:33, 13 March 2018 (PDT)


:The mere existence of [[Widget:YouTube]] indicates Apporpedia's support for the use of videos on the site.  A while back, [[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] and I were working on a yet-to-be implemented feature to [[User_talk:Chriswaterguy#Selected testimonials|show testimonials and videos on the Main Page]]. As part of that activity, I created [[Appropedia:List of videos]].  Based on the size of this list, Appropedia and its users clearly support the inclusion of videos here. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 16:24, 13 March 2013 (PDT)
== Vandalism: image uploaded revert fails, etc. ==


::I think videos can be very helpful and in fact require some projects to have them. If they are slowing down page loading (which should not be the case) we could probably delay their loading. So far, KVDP has a lot of great energy, but has been in error on almost every technical issue. KVDP, if you know more about web than appropriate technology, please let me know how the embedded videos are slowing down the pages and I will work with you to ameliorate that. Thank you all and please excuse my candor, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] 18:34, 13 March 2013 (PDT)
A new version of <nowiki>[[File:Thames sunset.jpg]]</nowiki> was uploaded yesterday. Revert failed. Deleting and re-uploading also failed to revert. This file currently used on 14 pages including (often on) [[Welcome to Appropedia/CAnews]]. Have blocked [[User:Xerou012]]. Advice appreciated on how best to get back to the intended image? [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 03:11, 1 November 2017 (PDT)
:Thank you. Sorry for the issues. The issue is that it can take more than a few minutes for a newly updated image to propagate through the system. It should be good on all of the pages now... it is for me. If it is not for you, please try doing a hard refresh of your browser. Thanks again, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 11:41, 1 November 2017 (PDT)
::Thanks, [[User:Lonny|Lonny]], [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 11:46, 1 November 2017 (PDT)
:::Thank you [[User:Philralph|Philralph]]! --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 22:25, 1 November 2017 (PDT)


:::I just updated [[:Category:Videos]] and [[Appropedia:List of videos]]. As of today, I found 165 pages that contain videos.  That's starting to look like a trend to me!  ;-) --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 10:26, 14 March 2013 (PDT)
== offer of  "help to ignite" / invite to collaboration to A People's Food Policy (UK) ==
::::Playing DA, I guess that doesn't prove that the embeds ''don't'' slow the loading of the page, but it does at least indicate that I'm correct in thinking that video embeds are a fairly common feature of Appropedia pages.  I'm not sure how we'd know whether the pages are really slowing down for people on slow connections.  This can't be a unique question with regard to wikis, so I'm thinking KVDP needs to provide some evidence that this is a real issue.  [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 10:53, 14 March 2013 (PDT)


:::::Clearly, having a slow connection makes any high-data page difficult to access. Personally, I have a dial-up connection at home, so I don't watch videos. However, that does ''not'' stop me from being able to view a page with an embedded video. What causes me more problems is [[Special:LongPages|Long pages]]. That's why I recently archived a zillion topics on this discussion page! ;-) --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 11:11, 14 March 2013 (PDT)
Have emailed an offer of  "help to ignite" / invite to collaboration to A People's Food Policy (UK) - copy of email on http://www.appropedia.org/Talk:Food_UK [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 09:23, 10 January 2018 (PST)


::::::Thanks for the archiving! Indeed, according to the measurements, long pages are much slower to render than pages with embedded videos. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] 14:49, 28 March 2013 (PDT)
:Excellent. Thanks. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 13:40, 10 January 2018 (PST)


== Extension  dynamicpagelist ==
== Why are you non-profit? ==


Hi could you add extension <nowiki>dynamicpagelist</nowiki> 
Why are you non-profit, when you can be for-profit, and use said profit to solve the problems of the world?
And <nowiki>#tag</nowiki> please
Like, document things by making youtube videos, to also get people to watch you helping people, maybe sell merchandise like any good youtube channel does, maybe even sell toy-versions of technologies useful for appropriation, maybe even some tiny e-book of only a few dozen pages, half or more being with only images (i.e. left page text and right page image to go with the text), maybe print some books to give to developing settlements, and make sure to include links or search terms for people who have internet access, and then you can go ahead and accept volunteers to help you out, eventually for the chance of being on youtube, being seen working. The whole point would be to be quite transparent in regards with what you're helping people with, and advertise your merchandise online with lines like "every 100 plushies helps us build one treadle pump well for a settlement, and you can watch us on youtube so you can see for yourself and show others that things ''can'' change for the better, if you invest in the right groups of people.
[[User:User555|User555]] 08:32, 15 March 2013 (PDT)


== Poor quality images ==
So let's do a recap:


KVDP is in the habit of uploading images onto Appropedia. Some of them are good. However, a good number of them are poor quality hand-drawn images that he has copied from a book. I'd like to suggest that this serves nobody any good. For example: [[:File:Hydroponics_NFT_setup.JPG]] and [[:File:Agriculture_manual_1_2_6_image_8.JPG]]
* Youtube videos of you doing actual work to help people, posted on your very own Youtube channel
* merchandise related to you doing some of that work, eventually also some e-books (PDFs) and possibly even physical books (i.e. through Amazon), and even selling the very tools and tech you're helping people with, with a plain cheap version for those in need, and a fancy version for those who can afford and want to support the cause.
* allow volunteers to help you out, in exchange for appearing in a video on Youtube, while they work.
* be for-profit instead of non-profit, so you can use the profit to help change the world for the better, one problem at a time.
* possibly also build a bikecar/velocar, which is a pedal powered 3-wheeler 4-wheeler (2 wheels in the front), and the frame can just be some painted textile (shell) resting on an skeleton (out of wood or metal, or even plastic). Preferably make it so it can change gears up to easily going 50 km/h (30 mph), or even faster (to be road-safe).


The problem is not just that they are hand-drawn. The problem is that the text is hard to read and the content is of dubious value.  I cannot see any justification for keeping either of these examples. Content should be accurate, images also need to be accurate, clear and useful. These are none of those things. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 06:49, 21 March 2013 (PDT)
[https://imgur.com/a/hF3LuuJ Here's a logo I've made for fun.] If you want to use it, I can give you the source files.


:I appreciate the tremendous dedication that KVDP shows, but I do find these images very hard to understand. Besides which, if we don't know the source for the knowledge or the thinking behind the image, we don't know how to assess it. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 19:23, 26 March 2013 (PDT)


::I have started a [[:Category:low quality images]] cat.  Some of these are actually better than others, but I think that they all either need to be drastically improved or removed.  As I said previously, KVDP has uploaded some really clear images, even on complex subjects, which he appears to have used CAT to produce - which is absolutely fair enough, I don't have that skill.  But these hand-drawn images are not good enough. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 01:55, 28 March 2013 (PDT)
Good luck!


:::Many of the images uploaded by KVDP are wrong. He has been open to change it, but the updated images are usually wrong as well. I wish that KVDP's energy and desire to draw/CAD could be partnered with people and projects that actually know what they are doing. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] 14:44, 28 March 2013 (PDT)
- Sapioit
:Non-profits can make a profit; it's just that this one doesn't. [[User:Koavf|Koavf]] ([[User talk:Koavf|talk]]) 20:45, 20 September 2018 (PDT)


::::I would venture to add that the majority of KVDP's edits are completely wrong, judging on the edits of subjects I know something about. I *really* don't understand what he thinks he is doing - why would you write things about subjects you clearly do not know anything about, and then <s>argue about it</s> (I take that back, he doesn't argue.  He just reverts for no good reason and tells me to go and work on a different page outside of my expertise) with someone who does?  None of us can possibly be any kind of expert in all of the subjects that KVDP seems to want to edit.  Most of his edits seem to be lifted from basic texts, I cannot speak to the engineering aspects as that is not my area of expertise.  At best his images in the natural sciences are so over-simplified as to be essentially useless, they usually have no scale or proper indication of what they are actually about and the text rarely explains them.  At worst, they are impossible to make head-nor-tail of.  But I feel fairly strongly that there are areas here that KVDP should not be editing.
::I understand. My point is, by being for-profit, it can become competitive enough to actually change the world fast enough to make a difference in more than just a very few remote places.


::::I don't know what to suggest - but my perception is that KVDP is attempting to create his own version of wikipedia, to hell with any notion of rigour and accuracy and science.  At the very least, I think his hand-drawn images should be removed.  I'm also open to seeing many of his others being removed as well, particularly where they do not seem to serve any AT purpose and are not even linked to any page. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 15:25, 28 March 2013 (PDT)
::- Sapioit


::::Further to the above, I have collected more than 50 hand-drawn images by KVDP in [[:Category:Low_quality_images]]. It seems likely that there are more than 100 of these scattered across Appropedia. I think KVDP can be notified that these will all be deleted after 7 days. Other CAT images of his are more difficult for me to assess, but I notice that very few of them have scales or sufficient explanations to be useful. Also I suspect there is not much truth in the idea that hand drawn images based substantially on images from elsewhere (say copyrighted books) are somehow not breaking copyright - or that they can therefore be licensed under the standard SA license. Most of the time these images are too general to be a problem, but I do sometimes wonder.  [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 04:08, 29 March 2013 (PDT)
::Thank you both. It is true that non-profits can sell products, advertising, etc. It is also true that for the most part, Appropedia does not do those things. We also agree that it is time to change that. The book [[To Catch the Rain]] is one of our first strong attempts at having a revenue stream to accelerate the impact of Appropedia. Indeed we need a lot of IT help (e.g. with spam abatement, updates, modernization, etc.) and server support (it costs hundreds of dollars a month to run servers that can keep up with our amount of traffic). Therefore, we need to bring in money just for those things... and then to thrive! Thanks again, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 16:10, 23 September 2018 (PDT)


== Organizational point of view ==
== Ideas to increase participation in Appropedia ==


From the early days of Appropedia, we've talked about an "Organizational point of view" applying to pages about an organization - and we've assumed that the same applies to a project page by an organization or individual, assuming the page isn't promoting something wrong or dangerous.
Hi all, not logged on here in a while although I have periodically browsed articles without logging on or editting.
I am sad to see that this wiki is not that busy (at least as far as I can see). I propose a few suggestions about how to increase participation (disclaimer, I do not know if any of these measures are already in place)


We're going to have to get much clearer about:
* It took me several mins to locate this page again, I feel since this page is the main forum for the whole site (?) it should be much more prominently signposted at the top of all of the major central pages (i.e. main page, "about" page, perhaps even a header on each individual talk page?
:(a) whether that's a good approach that should be adopted as policy, and if so,
:(b) how we apply the policy. (What about alternative points of view? Who decides if something is "wrong or dangerous," given that the organization has a special status in such a policy?)


E.g. [[User:Volunteeringsolutions]] was originally a mainspace article, but was moved to userspace because it looked like advertising. I agree with the move, but we need clearer guidelines. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 22:02, 26 March 2013 (PDT)
* I see that permies.com is listed as a collaborator. How about starting a group on that site for appropedia editors to raise awareness.


:I continue to support the principle that, until proven otherwise, Appropedia uses the same editorial principles as Wikipedia.  In this case, I believe the most concise reference is related to the assertion and section quoted below, Wikipedia is not a soapbox or means of promotion. The topical specifics include advocacy, propaganda, recruitment, opinion pieces, scandal mongering, self-promotion, and advertising. From my observations here, I would say Appropedia does actively serve as a vehicle for mission-related advocacy, recruitment, opinion pieces, and self-promotion.  Granted, there’s often a fine line to cross into the realm of advertising, but that line gets impenetrably thicker for me when the object of the page has no explicit connection to any form of interaction on Appropedia.
* In a similar vein, how about forming a group on wikipedia, indeed this is where many new editors could easily be attracted.


:If Appropedia were to get more explicit in terms of policy or guidelines in this area, I would support taking language like that shown below, modify what is acceptable to describe how that could be implemented, link to examples, and keep language related to what remains unacceptable.  I also would start using header templates to designate approved pages in these areas, such as like [[Wikipedia:Template:Essay]].
Anyway, I am very lazy these days but I want to collaborate a lot more. Pls msg me if anyone wishes to collaborate on writing articles. My areas of interest are broadly under the scope of "homesteading" ... natural building (particularly eathbag building, passive solar design, earth sheltering), sustainable + subsistence farming (e.g. forest gardening, small scale fruit and veg production), domestic scale + sustainable + off grid energy systems, aquaponics, etc.


----
Over the next few weeks I wish to deveolp material on earth tubes (ground coupled heat exchange).
'''<big>[[Wikipedia:Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not#Soapbox|Wikipedia is not a soapbox or means of promotion]]</big>'''<br>


Wikipedia is not a [[Wikipedia:soapbox|soapbox]], a battleground, or a vehicle for propaganda, advertising and showcasing. This applies to articles, categories, templates, talk page discussions, and user pages. Therefore, content hosted in Wikipedia is not for:
Best wishes, [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 07:39, 1 January 2019 (PST)


# '''Advocacy, [[Wikipedia:propaganda|propaganda]], or [[Wikipedia:recruitment|recruitment]]''' of any kind: commercial, political, religious, national, sports-related, or otherwise. An article can report objectively ''about'' such things, as long as an attempt is made to describe the topic from a [[Wikipedia:Wikipedia:neutral point of view|neutral point of view]]. You might wish to start a [[Wikipedia:blog|blog]] or visit a [[Wikipedia:Internet forum|forum]] if you want to convince people of the merits of your favorite views.<ref>Wikipedia pages may not be used for advocacy unrelated to Wikipedia, but pages ''in the [[Wikipedia:Wikipedia:Wikipedia namespace|Wikipedia namespace]]'' (also known as "project namespace") may be used to advocate for specific viewpoints regarding the improvement or organization of Wikipedia itself. So essays, portals, project pages, etc. are part of what Wikipedia is.</ref>
:Hi Moribund,
# '''Opinion pieces.''' Although some topics, particularly those concerning current affairs and politics, may stir passions and tempt people to "climb [[Wikipedia:soapbox|soapbox]]es" (for example, passionately advocate their pet point of view), Wikipedia is not the medium for this. Articles must be balanced to put entries, especially for [[Wikipedia:Portal:Current events|current events]], in a reasonable perspective, and represent a [[Wikipedia:WP:NPOV|neutral point of view]]. Furthermore, Wikipedia authors should strive to write articles that will not quickly become obsolete. However, Wikipedia's sister project [[Wikipedia:n:|Wikinews]] allows commentaries on its articles.
:Thanks for the suggestions. We are always hoping to grow the community. These few weeks around Jan 1st are always the most slow. That said, we were averaging over 100 edits a day for the last few months (and now have 388,398 edits to date!). Currently our efforts are focused on updating Appropedia's infrastructure so that it runs faster for everyone around the world. It will probably take another two months to finish the updates and migration (especially given our limited financial resources). Until then, maybe you could try forming the group on wikipedia (I am not sure how that works)?
# '''Scandal mongering,''' promoting things "heard through the grapevine" or gossiping. Articles and content [[Wikipedia:WP:Biographies of Living Persons|about living people]] are required to meet an especially high standard, as they may otherwise be [[Wikipedia:WP:LIBEL|libellous]] or infringe the subjects' right to [[Wikipedia:privacy|privacy]]. Articles should not be written purely to [[Wikipedia:WP:ATP|attack]] the reputation of another person.
:Thanks again, great to see you, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 00:31, 2 January 2019 (PST)
# '''Self-promotion.''' It can be tempting to write about yourself or projects in which you have a strong personal involvement. However, do remember that the standards for encyclopedic articles apply to such pages just like any other. This includes the requirement to maintain a neutral point of view, which can be difficult when writing about yourself or about projects close to you. Creating overly abundant links and references to autobiographical sources is unacceptable. See [[Wikipedia:Wikipedia:Autobiography|Wikipedia:Autobiography]], [[Wikipedia:Wikipedia:Notability|Wikipedia:Notability]] and [[Wikipedia:Wikipedia:Conflict of interest|Wikipedia:Conflict of interest]].
::I see there are threads on Permies.com already related to this wiki. On wikipedia it might be harder to create a group since they have to be very strict about having all community activity directly related to editing the encyclopedia. However one approach might be to post on talk pages for wikiprojects that might be interested in appropedia. The message would have to be carefully phrased to be relevant to the encyclpedia. For example, some content on appropedia might be useful in wikipedia articles. I also know that they do not allow for "how to manual" type content, and so appropedia pages might therefore be good to link to from encyclopedia articles. Regards, [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 04:54, 4 January 2019 (PST)
# '''Advertising.''' All information about companies and products are written in an [[Wikipedia:Wikipedia:Neutral point of view|objective and unbiased style]]. All article topics must be [[Wikipedia:WP:V|verifiable]] with [[Wikipedia:WP:Independent sources|independent]], [[Wikipedia:WP:Third-party sources|third-party sources]], so articles about very small "garage" or local companies are typically unacceptable. [[Wikipedia:Wikipedia:External links|External links]] to commercial organizations are acceptable if they identify [[Wikipedia:WP:N|notable]] organizations which are the topic of the article. Wikipedia neither endorses organizations nor runs affiliate programs. See also [[Wikipedia:Wikipedia:Notability (organizations and companies)|Wikipedia:Notability]] for guidelines on corporate notability. Those promoting causes or events, or issuing [[Wikipedia:public service announcement|public service announcement]]s, even if noncommercial, should use a forum other than Wikipedia to do so.


Non-disruptive statements of opinion on internal Wikipedia policies and guidelines may be made on user pages and within the Wikipedia: namespace, as they are relevant to the current and future operation of the project.
== Article about [[Earth tubes]] on Ekopedia ==
<references/>
----
--[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 09:03, 27 March 2013 (PDT)
: Hmm.  Dunno - I'm not sure we are doing the same thing as Wikipedia, so I'm not sure how helpful that is.  I'd say many articles here are opinion or gossip, hence my efforts to try to bring some level of scientific underpinning to the things I know about.  Ideally nobody would ever say anything on an Appropedia page that was not scientifically proven - or at the very least inject some notes of caution into ideas which are in dispute.  The reality is that nobody has time to be arguing with people who insist they have the right to edit and insert wrong information.  In fact, you know, I probably would have time to argue with people, because if they argued and discussed, I'd have less of a problem.  What makes me really mad is uncited unproven hearsay, particularly when the end result is actually dangerous.  Is that a soapbox?  Possibly.  But I think we have far more of a responsibility to ensure that our information is correct than wikipedia.  Because at the end of the day, we're actually expecting people to use this stuff. I therefore think we need a scientific board.  None of us are infallible, of course, but I think the first priority should be on accurate and safe advice.  I don't think it is really too much to ask people who are making wild claims to provide sources and to discuss the points. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 10:23, 27 March 2013 (PDT)


:: Oops, rereading Chris' point, I think maybe he is referring to the point-of-view '''of''' the organisation which is inserting the page.  My point above was addressing whether Appropedia itself should have a point-of-view.  Sorry for the tangent! [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 10:28, 27 March 2013 (PDT)
I've started the [[Earth tubes]] article on appropedia. I could not see it exactly covered when searching here, the nearest was [[Ground source heat pumps]].


== Things that should not be on appropedia ==
Anyway, I can see there is a lot of good info on the Ekopedia article about the same topic [https://www.ekopedia.fr/wiki/Puits_canadien]


*1. A schematic on how to make an air-rifle: [[:File:Indiginous_hunter_air_rifle.jpg]].  Is anyone seriously thinking that someone will be able to use this to make a gun?  Even if we wanted to tell people how to do it, the process is high precision engineering.  The idea is absurd. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 02:20, 28 March 2013 (PDT)
I've used the google translate feature to try and read the article with limited success.  
*2. A compound bow, [[:File:Improved_compound_bow.JPG]] for similar reasons.  I think you've got a good chance of cutting yourself in half if you attempted to use this diagram to make a bow. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 02:24, 28 March 2013 (PDT)
*3.  Maps that are hard to read and/or do not really add anything.  For example: [[:File:Native_honey_producing_stingless_bees.png]] [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 09:28, 28 March 2013 (PDT)
*4. Religious diagrams that infer certain religions can be considered to be at the centre and others at the periphery.  [[:File:Religion_pendant.PNG]] [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 09:33, 28 March 2013 (PDT)
::Icons such as this typically are used on Wikipedia to visually represent a topical theme.  For example, [[Wikipedia:Portal:Contents/Types TOC]] shows a collection of icons used in the table of contents for [[Wikipedia:Portal:Contents/Portals]], among other contents pages.  Since Appropedia doesn't have such a structure or style, I'm not sure how such an icon would be used here. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 12:52, 28 March 2013 (PDT)
:::Richard, if you look at the image description, KVDP is clearly making a statement about the relative worth of different religions.  If find it hard to believe that there is anyone from any religion (except perhaps unitarianism) who would not find this diagram offensive at worst and laughable at best.  I don't think KVDP is attempting to create icons for portals, but heavens, I have no idea what he is doing other than filling pages with worthless piffle. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 15:14, 28 March 2013 (PDT)


::::Okay, my original comment wasn't about the description on the page, just the image.  When I searched for it on [http://tineye.com/ tineye], I came up empty.  That suggests the image is original work. I'll comment on the broader issue of this topic below. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 17:01, 28 March 2013 (PDT)
It would be good to merge the content with the appropedia article.  
*5. Projectile Weapons: for example this pipe bomb [[:File:AT_mortar.JPG]] [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 09:36, 28 March 2013 (PDT)
*6. Chainmail.  Words fail. [[:File:AT_haubergeon.JPG]] [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 09:40, 28 March 2013 (PDT).  Actually, y'know I quite like that one.  But under what circumstances would someone coming to Appropedia find it useful to know about medieval protective clothing?
*7. Marvin, the slightly scary looking Android [[:File:Android_design.JPG]]
*8 The airship project. Not-at-all my area of expertise, but I really doubt that this has any merit on a AT wiki, and I'd suspect is mostly wrong.  Seriously, who is going to read this stuff?  [[AT_CAD_Team/AT_airship]] [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 15:34, 28 March 2013 (PDT)
*9 Pages which do not seem to relate to their titles - for example [[Original_environment_rehabilitation_manual_2.11]] appears to be a ridiculously oversimplified page about afforestation. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 04:21, 3 April 2013 (PDT)
*10 Electrical shock weapon. [[:File:Doble_baston_design.png]]  Really.  What.The.Hell.Is.This.Here.For? [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 00:54, 4 April 2013 (PDT)


KVDP, maybe you can enlighten me what any of these things have to do with the focus of Appropedia. Most of them are not even linked to any pages, so why on earth are they here? [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 09:49, 28 March 2013 (PDT)
I note that Ekopedia content is being merged with appropedia? Has translation already been done somewhere? Regards, [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 15:11, 5 January 2019 (PST)
:Sounds great! Eventually we hope to merge completely...but that is not currently happening. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 10:51, 6 January 2019 (PST)


:The broader issue I see here is the need for clearer criteria about files and pages that are candidates for deletion, such as at [[Wikipedia:Wikipedia:Files for deletion]]. The basic reasons for deleting a file there are:
== Reporting spam ==
:* '''Obsolete'''&nbsp;– The file has been replaced by a better version.
:* '''Orphan'''&nbsp;– The file is not used on any pages in Wikipedia.
:* '''Unencyclopedic'''&nbsp;– The file doesn't seem likely to be useful in any Wikimedia project.
:* '''Low quality'''&nbsp;– The file is of an extremely low resolution, distorted, or has other physical image quality concerns.
:* '''Copyright violation'''&nbsp;– The file might be used in violation of copyright.
:* '''NFCC violation'''&nbsp;– The file is used under a claim of fair use but does not meet the requirements.
:If we had clearer criteria here, it would be much more straightforward on how to proceed. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 17:01, 28 March 2013 (PDT)


::I strongly support the idea of strong, clear criteria. We could combine and change the ones above into something like:
Not sure of normal procedure you have on this wiki, but I suspect these accounts represent paid editor(s) who are posting spam links. Also I would take this moment to point out large volume of new user accounts each day, and only a tiny handful are used to edit. Suspect the new accounts are being started by a bot. Is there a way to make the process of starting an account more robust? Regards, [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 11:36, 21 January 2019 (PST)
::* '''Not used''' – The file has been replaced by a better version or is otherwise not being used on any page of Appropedia.
* [http://www.appropedia.org/User:Appsng]
::* '''Very low quality''' – The file is of an extremely low resolution, distorted, or has other physical image quality concerns.
* [http://www.appropedia.org/User:Elissasmart]
::* '''Copyright violation''' – The file might be used in violation of copyright.
* [http://www.appropedia.org/User:Labelle]
::* '''Dangerous''' – The file represents something very wrong or something dangerous without clear warnings.
::On a side note: I think we should have a separate namespace for speculative pages. Something like appropedia.org/Speculative:Some_page.
::Thoughts? --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] 17:26, 28 March 2013 (PDT)


:::I like the prospects of moving forward with a clearer mechanism for deleting questionable content, whether files or pages. The revised examples above for files are fine with me. The notion of a "Speculation" (counterproposal :-) namespace sounds worth pursuing too. Wikipedia's [[Wikipedia:WP:SPECULATION]] no-nos include at least a couple of page types probably worth supporting here.
:Hi Moribund,
::::3. Articles that present original research in the form of '''extrapolation, speculation, and "future history"''' are inappropriate. While scientific and cultural norms continually evolve, we must wait for this evolution to happen, rather than try to predict it. Of course, we do and should have articles ''about'' '''notable''' ''artistic works, essays, or credible research'' that embody predictions. An article on ''Weapons of Star Trek'' is appropriate; an article on "Weapons to be used in World War III" is not.
:Thanks for pointing those out. We recently have made the process of starting an account more robust. It helped substantially, but there is still much more to do. Our next steps are upgrading the servers and implementing some other spam prevention tools, that hopefully will not increase the difficulty of creating an account and making edits for real users.
::::4. While currently accepted scientific paradigms may later be rejected, and hypotheses previously held to be controversial or incorrect sometimes become accepted by the scientific community, it is not the place of Wikipedia to venture such projections.
:I deleted the offending pages. You can always edit a spam page and replace it with <nowiki>{{delete|spam}}</nowiki>. Or, if you are interested, we could provide you spam deletion privileges as an admin.
:::The Speculation namespace also could relate to parts of the discussion at [[Appropedia:Village pump#Organizational point of view]], particularly in terms of essays. Here's a repeat comment I made there. If Appropedia were to get more explicit in terms of policy or guidelines in this area [promotions & opinions], I would support taking language like that shown below, modify what is acceptable to describe how that could be implemented, link to examples, and keep language related to what remains unacceptable. I also would start using header templates to designate approved pages in these areas, such as like [[Wikipedia:Template:Essay]]. What come to mind here for me is the collection of essays, [[The future we deserve]] ([[Book:The Future We Deserve|Book]]). To me, those pages meet the criterion of "worthy speculation." The question then becomes, is such speculation worthy of its own namespace.  My answer: Sure. Why not?!
:Thanks again, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 14:03, 21 January 2019 (PST)
:::At the same time, we also will need to keep in mind the role of [[Appropedia:Incubator]]. Criteria for distinguishing whether a page should go to Speculation or the incubator will need to be clear enough to make that call. I assume speculation pages should be well written and supported but unproven. Incubator pages need work and/or are of questionable value even if well written. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 18:56, 28 March 2013 (PDT)


::::Lonny and Richard - my thoughts are that I don't like the idea of the speculation namespace.  In my view, if material is dangerous, low quality etc it should be removed, not just moved to userspace or a speculation namespace.  Having this (the speculation) namespace suggests something might be dangerous or low quality etc but is kept on the basis that it ''might'' at some point in the future get to be useful on Appropedia. To take the airship example, I am not qualified to assess the aeronautical design, but even if I was, it requires a massive leap of the imagination to see that as relevant to Appropedia.  Unless we actually have someone who is skilled in that area - and unless they can give a reasoned argument about how this could be used today in an Appropriate Technology context, this is nonsense/dangerous. Simply moving it to another namespace does not hide or change the nature of the piece nor (I think) does it hide it from external search engine view or make it unviewable by visitors. 
::If you feel that admins are needed then ok, I will need instruction on that though. Otherwise I will pages I see as directed above.
::On the topic, this user ([[Special:Contributions/Andromeda]]) is pasting the same link on many user pages. Regards, [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 14:34, 24 January 2019 (PST)


::::The only possible reason for keeping space for things that are 'speculative' as defined above is for ideas that groups are working on. I think theFWD project can properly be described as ''worthy'' speculative, although the pieces individually stray into areas which are not AT, in my opinion. The vision was to create something collaboratively, the process was one of learning, and the idea was that the authors and others read and engage with what the others have said. I think that is a useful model to keep, encourage and repeat.  I'd therefore agree that future books and projects of this kind can be put into their own namespace.  These and student projects are always labelled as works-in-progress and I have faith that instructors watch and remove questionable content in these spaces.  KVDP's pages that I have highlighted above are not, as far as I can see, in any way collaborative work-in-progress projects and they are not about AT either.
:::Thank you. I have nominated you and I will follow up soon. I also posted a request to Andromeda. Thanks for pointing that out. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 18:39, 24 January 2019 (PST)
* Another user page + user talk page that is being used for spam, would appreciate an admin taking a look [http://www.appropedia.org/index.php?title=User:Phen375&oldid=382858] + [http://www.appropedia.org/User_talk:Phen375]. Kind regards, [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 06:55, 17 February 2019 (PST)
:::: I'm pleased with the recent tuning of the spam filters. The frequency of spam has dropped considerably. Of the 10 pages I just deleted 9 of them were user pages, so that's probably the area we should focus on next. Thanks for the vigilance Moribund. --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 18:41, 22 February 2019 (PST)
::::::I get the feeling since it is exactly the same pattern of spam each now that it is the same individual / bot doing it. [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 12:01, 23 February 2019 (PST)
:::::::Thank you Moribund for accepting the responsibilities of being an [[Appropedia:Administrators|admin]]! --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 19:45, 11 March 2019 (PDT)
Congrats, welcome to the team! --[[User:Ethan|Ethan]] ([[User talk:Ethan|talk]]) 02:08, 12 March 2019 (PDT)
::OK Thanks, I'll do my best. [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 11:32, 12 March 2019 (PDT)


::::I'd therefore propose that the incubator be kept for projects that individuals are developing that meet a basic standard for inclusion - in the vast majority of cases are about AT.  Group projects whilst in progress might be in their own namespace, clearly labelled, but individuals should not be able to use group namespace as cover for their own ideas - because if all pages can be viewed, we all have some level of responsibility for the way that it reflects onto Appropedia and everything else here.  If it is simply an individual's personal speculation with no conceivable way to ever get back to the point of Appropedia, it should be removed altogether. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 02:13, 29 March 2013 (PDT)
==Registration==
On a related note, the page [[Appropedia:About]] states "Registration is encouraged but not required for contributors." As far as I can see this needs to be updated, it is currently necessary to have an account and ot be logged in to edit pages? [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 10:03, 24 February 2019 (PST)
:Thank you for pointing this out. It is now fixed. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 19:45, 11 March 2019 (PDT)


:::::Joe, all your points are well taken.  If an individual piece does not meet Appropedia's criteria of relevance and quality, then it should be removed. What would help the community better make those case-by-case decisions is to clarify those criteria by which content should be judged. Moving forward, not only would that help making decisions about what should stay or go, but authors also would have a better idea about what should or shouldn't be added in the first place. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 04:51, 29 March 2013 (PDT)
== Should these 2 categories be merged together? ==


{{undent}} ''Re chainmail'': "under what circumstances would someone coming to Appropedia find it useful to know about medieval protective clothing?" The best positive answer I can think of is in preparation for a [[zombie apocalypse]] - which is often used as a metaphor for a major disaster, and [http://www.emergencymgmt.com/emergency-blogs/campus/Disaster-preparedness-zombie-meme-040113.html even used in disaster preparedness efforts by the CDC (US Center for Disease Control)]. It does seem to be a useful and engaging metaphor. Seriously, though, I'm not convinced that information is chain mail is useful here, but I don't think it's very harmful.
* Category:Gardening
* Category:Horitulcture and gardening


''Re airship'': I didn't realize that was in mainspace - thanks. I've now [[A:Userfication|userfied]] it, deselecting the option to create a redirect so it doesn't have exposure in mainspace. (Admins can suppress redirects). For now it's at [[User:KVDP/AT CAD Team/AT airship]] - see [[User talk:KVDP #Userfied some pages]] for others. Ultimately we need agreement about how to handle such pages, and this will presumably be deleted.
I note also that Category:Agriculture contains many articles which are specifically about cultivation of plants rather than production of other types of food.


''Re speculative content'': There is value and danger in speculation - the challenge is to keep content which is "well written and supported but unproven" (RichardF) but remove that which is dangerous, low quality etc. I support removing content ''entirely'' from all Appropedia namespaces if it's dangerous or promotes something very counter-productive, such as so-called free energy devices or unproven aircraft designs.
Unless anyone has any objections I was thinking of merging the 2 categories above and moving some plant specific pages from agriculture to the subcategory of Horticulture and gardening. Kind regards, [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 10:37, 20 March 2019 (PDT)


Note that we have a {{tl|status-design}} tag: "This [[Open Source Appropriate Technology|OSAT]] has been [[:Category:Status#Status:Design| designed]] but not yet tested - use at own risk." This is in a similar spirit to speculative content.
:No objections from me. Thanks! --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 16:17, 20 March 2019 (PDT)


Note also the page [[Appropedia:Speculative content]] from 2010.
== Autoblock triggering for unrelated IPs ==


My ideas re both speculative content and incubators:
I have seen several instances of this happening.  
* Speculative content that seems reasonable (by whatever standards we agree on for mainspace) stays on Appropedia, either:
*# In a speculation namespace, or
*# In mainspace, clearly flagged. I've suggested a {{tl|status-speculative}} tag to [[A:Status]]. Given the seriousness of someone overlooking such a tag, I suggest we ''also'' have some variety of unmissable {{tl|speculative}} notice at the top.
* Dangerous content, content which could seriously mislead readers, and content which could lead Appropedia into disrepute is deleted. (We'll want to carefully define "could lead Appropedia into disrepute" so it's not open to misuse or perceptions of misuse.)
* Seriously problematic content that's not dangerous or spammy gets moved to some kind of incubator. I worry about the incubator getting cluttered though, so I'm thinking about splitting the incubator - e.g.
*# An incubator for each university class. This (A) reduces the cleanup needed after each class (which generally falls on the volunteer community); (B) reduces the exposure of articles which don't yet have anything that makes sense; and (C) enables an academic to easily see which of their students' work is still in the incubation phase.
*# One for serious works in progress ("for projects that individuals are developing that meet a basic standard for inclusion" in Joeturner's words).
*# One for off-topic and "what the heck is this?" pages. That's more of a storage space than an actual incubator, as most of the pages would never re-enter mainspace. This one serves several purposes for Appropedia: (A) It enables us to be more friendly and maintain goodwill - not causing unneeded grief to people who've made honest mistakes, so we're more likely to make friends through the process, than enemies. The person who gets an article on crystal healing deleted may easily become a friend who tells people about Appropedia, or a contributor in a different area. (Note that Wikipedia has a few annoying enemies, and I think a lot of them started out by having an article deleted and having unfriendly notices left on their Wikipedia talk page.); (B) It minimizes the damage done by honest mistakes, if an admin thinks something is complete crap when it's not; (C) It softens the immediate reaction by people who've had their content removed from mainspace, which in turn reduces the stress and time demands on admins.
*# [[A:Userfication]] where one editor creates a significant number of pages that need to be removed from mainspace. This is especially useful if they don't have strong prospects for going back to mainspace. They're out of the way, but accessible, and the ball is in the editor's court, to improve the page and prove it worth putting in mainspace.
--[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 21:01, 2 April 2013 (PDT)


:Chris - even in a circumstance of zombie attack, you need high level blacksmithing skills to produce chainmail.   Even if you had/were interested in getting those skills, I do not believe KVDP's diagram is useful because I see no evidence that he has any technical skills in blacksmithing. Hence the page is superfluous at best, and I believe brings Appropedia into disrepute.
# [https://www.appropedia.org/User:CRlightingAudio] when I accidentally edited a spam page without being logged in. Lonny deleted the page, Ethan later blocked the user. I was then prevented from editing, and it was assumed that autoblock triggered because of this. However, I noticed that the block message stated that he intended blockee was 66.33.193.178 ... and this would definately not be any IP I would have used.
# (event copied from log)[https://www.appropedia.org/index.php?title=User:Provitazol_Review_tab&action=edit&redlink=1] "21:05, 22 March 2019 Lonny changed block settings for Provitazol Review tab (Talk | Contributions) with an expiry time of indefinite (account creation disabled, autoblock disabled) (Abusing multiple accounts - I changed the IP to not be blocked as somehow it was also my IP??"
# I think the same thing happened? [https://www.appropedia.org/index.php?title=User:BecomingLimitless_Review01&action=edit&redlink=1]
# An Appropedia user messaged me saying they had autoblocked, related to this block: [https://www.appropedia.org/User:Mela_Luna_Sleep_Aid_Review]. The user tells me that the block message they received tells them that the indended blockee is 66.33.193.178, user also mentions that this is not their IP.
# Another appropedia user messaged me saying they had been blocked when they tried to edit their user page. They did not give any details so I am waiting for more info.  


:I was thinking about this over the weekend, I believe KVDP regularly suffers from a form of [http://www.logicallyfallacious.com/index.php/logical-fallacies/86-fake-precision false precision].  Take for example his recent page [[Making_jam,_jelly_and_marmalade]].  Making jam (or any other kind of recipe) is a subject which fills enormous bookshelves, so the idea that you could write anything sensible on a single page is largely moot to start with.   And I think we have to ask ourselves whether we serve any function in providing information that has the appearance of precision (in a fairly complex subject such as this).  In each case we have to imagine a person arriving here at Appropedia without a basic understanding of the subject. In this case, he would have to at least know the word 'jam' to find it.  Would the page then give him enough accurate information to use and get reliable results?  I don't think so.  In fact, I think we are far better in a large number of situations in having a single paragraph of explanation and links to better sources where the breadth is too great for us to explain and which we would inevitably confuse by summarising. If we attempt to reinvent the wheel, but in the process miss out several of the spokes and make the thing sound far more simple than it actually is, how are we helping and who are we imagining would find this information useful?  I think we should focus on signposting, collating and discussing information (in particular when it is hard to find) in AT in almost all situations where we do not have personal experience.  I can't see that there is a need for jam or other recipes here at all. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 00:50, 3 April 2013 (PDT)
Note that the IP from 2 of these cases is the same (New Dream Network, LLC). I am starting to suspect the intended blockee will be the same in the other cases as well? Sommething seems to be going wrong here. I am concerned that this will discourage legitimate users from contributing. I have provisionally disabled the autoblock on all recent blocks (the blocks I did anyway), as this does not seem to stop the continued creation of user accounts that will post spam anyway. If anyone knows anything about this, please post. Kind regards, [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 01:43, 23 March 2019 (PDT)


:Regarding Chris' 'making enemies' point, which I think is a good one: we have to balance the potential for offence with the seriousness of the error and the length that the editor has been working on Appropedia pages.  There is a certain level of offence implicit in removing any amount of material, particularly large amounts that I am advocating of KVDP's images above. For me, the need for standards is more important than avoiding '''all possible''' offence to editors. I'd suggest that material which does not meet standards is quarantined (with a clear template) for a set amount of time with the editor responsible notified of imminent deletion and the reasons why. I agree with Richard that this process is much easier if there are clearer standards, but I do not even think it is so difficult with the policies and standards that we have. The alternative is that we get editors who add large amounts of material without any form of peer review or discussion and the worst they can expect is for some of it to be userified.  In my view that isn't good enough.  If the user consistently refuses to engage with the (and let's be honest, it is a pretty mild form of) peer review process and refuses to improve the pages they have started, they should just be removed in short order. In my view the difference is between taking time to work with a new user to discover what it is that they know and helping them to present it in a reliable/readable way and allowing long time users to fill pages with rubbish.  If everyone is agreed that these (kinds of) years-old pages are not good enough, why are we keeping them?  At present it seems a little unfair that we're talking specifically about KVDP, but it seems to me that he has been adding more pages and images than anyone else recently.  Delving deeper may well uncover other questionable content, but my impression is that there are a very large number of largely worthless pages on Appropedia, which dilutes the effect of the really good ones. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 03:23, 3 April 2013 (PDT)
:: Another case of the same today, msg states intended blockee 66.33.193.178. Anyone shed some light on this? It seems the autoblock feature is nonfunctional. [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 13:19, 16 April 2019 (PDT)


{| class="wikitable" style="float:right; margin: 0em 0em 0em 1em"
:::I am messaging [[User:Chriswaterguy]] and Roger about this. It seems to have started happening right after we enabled a new type of caching. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 18:15, 21 April 2019 (PDT)
|+ [[Special:ActiveUsers|30 days of edits]]
|-
! User
! Edits
|-
| [[User:RichardF|RichardF]] ||align=right| 1,127
|-
| [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] ||align=right| 997
|-
| [[User:KVDP|KVDP]] ||align=right| 396
|-
| [[User:User555|User555]] ||align=right| 338
|-
| [[User:J.M.Pearce|J.M.Pearce]] ||align=right| 146
|-
| [[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] ||align=right| 141
|}


::Chris – I support your suggestions on how to address speculative, dangerous and seriously problematic content. What do you suggest as next steps?
:::::OK, thanks. [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 23:19, 21 April 2019 (PDT)


:: Joe – I agree many of the pages on Appropedia diminish its overall quality and usability. I expect Chris’ suggestions can address the page quality issue as time goes by. What we also appear to need in this area is a few more appropriately sustainable collaborative process solutions for [[wikipedia:chaff#metaphor|separating the wheat from the chaff]]. ;-)
::::::Yep... happened again to some students for IP 66.33.193.178 which was blocked for [[User:Traydugout59]]. Hopefully we will get to the bottom of this soon. I realize the timing corresponds with the new caching and moving to https (from http).--[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 00:24, 22 April 2019 (PDT)


::Taking a look at the group of users who made more than 100 edits in the past 30 days, four of them are admins and two are users who have been the subjects of several quality control issues of late. This says to me that our overall quality control administrative processes lack sufficient rigor. If admins take appropriate steps to address user editing process issues, then page quality issues can be more systematically addressed and improved over time. My suggestion on this front is for consistently high-volume, questionable quality users to be contacted by site leadership (Lonny and/or his explicit designates) to point out the applicable issues and establish a set of expectations for improvement within a given timetable. If those expectations are not met within the allotted time, then editing ''privileges'' will be curtailed.
:::::::Woohoo! Roger fixed it. For prosperity - it stemmed from not adding our server's own IP to $wgSquidServers. Should be good to go from now on out. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 15:14, 22 April 2019 (PDT)
::::::::OK, I'll try it again. thanks, [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 10:59, 23 April 2019 (PDT)


::By addressing recurring high-volume process issues, admins and other users will have more time to address sorting out existing and future page quality issues. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 08:47, 3 April 2013 (PDT)
== Is this spam? ==


As a general observation, it appears that the majority of projects in the [[AT_CAD_Team]] are largely, or entirely, KVDP's work. I think all those pages need to be looked at by qualified admin, but given what has been said about aeroplane projects above, I'd particularly point to [[:File:SP_airplane_2.png]] and [[Watervehicle_conversion]] and [[AT_CAD_Team/AT_Stirling_motors]]  and [[AT_CAD_Team/AT_freight_aircraft]] as being at least potentially dangerous. One project even has an anon comment on the talkpage that suggests the idea is impossible: [[Talk:AT_CAD_Team/AT_catamaran]][[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 00:34, 4 April 2013 (PDT)
Any opinions about whether these pages all created by the same user suitable for this wiki? They all appear to be products of the company listed first. I feel they probably should all be deleted. [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 10:59, 29 May 2019 (PDT)  


I am going to make an executive decision to immediately remove weapons and torture devices I find on Appropedia pages. I'm sorry, but this stuff should not be here. At all. I thought I'd seen some stuff, but that just about takes the plate of biscuits. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 00:58, 4 April 2013 (PDT)
* [[Zhengzhou_Fusmar_Machinery_Co.,Ltd]]
* [[Flat Die Wood Pellet Machine]]
* [[Small Fish Feed Pellet Machine]]
* [[Charcoal briquette production line‎]]
* [[Fish feed pellet production line]]
* [[Ring Die Wood Pellet Machine‎‎]]
:One of those is a red link. Checking only [[Charcoal briquette production line‎]], that doesn't seem to be spam but it is poorly written and unattested. [[User:Koavf|Koavf]] ([[User talk:Koavf|talk]]) 12:25, 29 May 2019 (PDT)


== A progress bar template ==
::I agree that they are too spammy. I went ahead and deleted them and left a message in the summary and for Amy at [[User_talk:Amyyan]]. Thank you! --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 14:24, 29 May 2019 (PDT)


Here’s a template I like to use to help me see how far behind schedule I am. {{tl|Progression}} displays a bar 100% wide that is colored some percent complete. It can display the percent complete from a single number or from one number divided by another. It also can display a custom label on the bar. Here are a few examples.
== Links to site: "Earthava" ==


;given percent
Hi, just wanted to raise concerns about the actions of this user: [[Special:Contributions/Samalmaairgy]]
<tt><nowiki>{{Progression|36.7}}</nowiki></tt> :
{{Progression|36.7}}


;calculated percent
I have not checked every single one of their contributions, however the clear pattern seems to be entirely restricted to adding of links to the blog / website "Earthava" (recently rebranded from Survival Renewable Energy") [https://www.earthava.com/about/]
<tt><nowiki>{{Progression|200|300}}</nowiki></tt> :
{{Progression|200|300}}


;calculated percent + label
Back in 2015 I can see Lonny requested that the user make more substantial contributions than merely posting links to the site. This appears to have gone unanswered (at least in public). The user name seems to be set up by the owner of the site (Assmaa Almaairgy 'Sam') and I feel it can be said that this user is editing this wiki 100% for self promotional reasons.
<tt><nowiki>{{Progression|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES:R}}|6000|task=Go from {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} to 6,000 articles}}</nowiki></tt> :
{{Progression|{{NUMBEROFARTICLES:R}}|6000|task=Go from {{NUMBEROFARTICLES}} to 6,000 articles}}


<tt><nowiki>{{Progression|{{#expr:({{CURRENTWEEK}}-1)*7+{{CURRENTDOW}}}}|365|task=This year is}}</nowiki></tt> :
While the website contains a some info of use, the nature of some of the content seems a bit too commercially motivated, e.g.:
{{Progression|{{#expr:({{CURRENTWEEK}}-1)*7+{{CURRENTDOW}}}}|365|task=This year is}}


Try it out!  :-) --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 12:05, 9 April 2013 (PDT)
* An app for users to enter their address and get a free estimate of how much money they could save by having PV system installed, likely later to be contacted by an installation company. Presumably there is a financial agreement between the owner of the site and the company giving the quote.


== Appropedia site stats ==
* "Top 10 product reviews" format pages, of which there many examples some of which linked directly from this wiki, listing price comparisons and give links to amazon to purchase products. Presumably those are affiliate links which earn revenue for the site owner. (examples [https://www.earthava.com/top10-10-best-solar-chargers/][https://www.earthava.com/10-best-solar-water-heater-systems/]) Indeed, it is unclear if there is any financial relationship between the product manufacturers and the site owner.


I added some [[Special:Statistics|Appropedia site stats]] to the top of this page. I also added a simple graph to show how page views change over a little slice of time.  I didn't bother to show the total number of users ({{NUMBEROFUSERS}}) because the vast majority probably aren't real people. Too bad we can't tell how many of the edits and views are by real people. ;-) --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 07:41, 11 April 2013 (PDT)
I feel the user is acting in bad faith and has showed no intention of changing their behaviour for many years, and that these links should all be removed since they add little to the wiki. Thoughts? Kind regards, [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 13:37, 17 June 2019 (CDT)


:Are redlink userpages classed as 'real' pages?  Is there some kind of database where we can remove them? [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 08:11, 11 April 2013 (PDT)
:Hi Moribund,
:I agree with your general assessment.
:Eventually, we need to decide if we have a spot for links like this with a small sponsorship cost (that also pays for someone to make sure the linked information is appropriate)...but that is a different and much bigger conversation (one started at [[Appropedia:Supporters/FAQ]]).
:On to [[Samalmaairgy]]'s contributions. Sam seems well intentioned with a quite small social media presence. I think it is reasonable to reverse the majority of her edits. I think it is reasonable for her to promote her blog on her userpage ([[User:Samalmaairgy]]). I would love if she started adding value to Appropedia as her spirit and background seem to fit well. I will reach out to her on her instagram at instagram.com/assmaa.almaairgy/ to let her know. It is very possible that she never saw my comments on her talk page and is acting in what she thinks is good faith.
:Thank you for catching this and for your thoughts. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]])


::A red link isn't a page, so those aren't counted as pages. However, they are counted as [[Special:ListUsers|users]]. I expect there is some way to delete them from the database, but that's beyond my pay grade. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 09:52, 11 April 2013 (PDT)
Hello There,


After watching the edits and page views for a day, the Edits are at 158 and the Views are at 35,807, for 227 Views/Edit! Until I looked at the numbers like this, it really didn't sink in how popular this site is...with the bots. Overall, the Views/Edit are at 173, suggesting the site is getting even more popular with somethings as time goes by. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 12:24, 12 April 2013 (PDT)
I am Sam, I am glad I came across this discussion by coincidence because no one has informed me directly about this issue. I can see the concern here regarding my actions here on Appropedia. I want to reply to the first concern about my actions and that fact that they are for promotional purposes. First of all the banner at the bottom of the articles is well-known and widely used among big websites. Treehugger.com uses this banner sitewide. and I believe that there are too many links that link back to Treehugger in Appropedia with no problem. Also, I think Appropedia has no problem to link to websites that are showing ads.  


:That is depressing. I wonder how many of those edits were content rather than admin - not many I'd guess. Sometimes I look at pages and wonder if the content makes a visit here more useful than wikipedia. Mostly, I doubt it. We could lose 99% of pages and be no worse off I think. We are drowning in repeated and/or poor content and we really need to work on providing more directly relevant AT material otherwise we are fighting a losing battle. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 01:48, 13 April 2013 (PDT)
Second of all, Regarding the top 10 products articles, My first concern was to add value to Appropedia pages, I make sure that the page is relevant, so if the article talks about solar garden lights I search for a relevant page that talks about solar lighting or garden lights.


{{:Welcome to Appropedia/Selected quote/9}}
Third of all, not all of my contributions are about 10 top products. I added many relevant articles in these Appropedia pages:-


::Yes, sometimes less is more. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]]
https://www.appropedia.org/Solar_energy_conversion_system
https://www.appropedia.org/Energy_from_the_wind


:::I agree that we could do way better at getting people to great content fast. Eventually it would be great if a visitor could answer a few questions (e.g. location, context, desired outcomes, resources) and get suggested content. I agree that we would benefit from merging the best parts of information based pages into less pages. I also think that the project based pages, which bring something very unique, are great to have in large numbers. Learning how different groups addressed similar problems in various contexts, seeing their successes and failures, and learning from the various methods allows for much greater understanding. I think that divergent project pages followed by convergent analysis will allow us to not only provide those varied examples but also be able to cull more general rules for our non-project based pages. Does that make sense?
The articles I mentioned there provide relevant information with no products showing. unless back to my first point Appropedia does not allow to link to websites that are showing ad banners.  
:::PS - That stats bar is so cool!
:::--[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] 17:29, 13 April 2013 (PDT)


::::I agree, the student pages and reports of in-field experiences are the best and most useful parts of appropedia.
According to what you mentioned, "that because of my 'small' social media presence I try to seek promotion in somewhere else like Appropedia." Though it seems offensive, I won't focus on it much because my first intention was to add value to Appropedia then comes my benefits. I think it is not fair to reverse all of my contributions. And, for the time being, I will stop any further contributions here on Appropedia, because I wished that there were instant notices to my contributions instead if just talking about it without me even knowing if I was doing something that goes against Appropedia Rules.


::::other pages mostly only repeat what is better said elsewhere, and could be replaced with relevant links.
Thank you! --<small>—The preceding [[Help:Signatures|comment]] was added by [[User:Samalmaairgy|Samalmaairgy]] ([[User talk:Samalmaairgy|talk]] • [[Special:Contributions/Samalmaairgy|contribs]]) 13:40, 19 June 2019‎ </small>


::::to get the unique-to-us pages into a find-able and readable format and to remove or change the rest would be a major task. And a serious chànge of direction. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 23:39, 13 April 2013 (PDT)


:::::Lonny - can the [[Special:Ask|Semantic search]] features help with finding the most relevant pages? If so, a project that focused on the "search-worthy" pages could pull out those topics that highlight Appropedia's strengths while ignoring the "extra" pages. This search feature could be highlighted on the Main Page. That way, it's not so much about cleaning the entire house, it's more about putting the good stuff in the parlor. ;-) --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 06:06, 14 April 2013 (PDT)
::Hello Sam,
::Thank you so much for your response. First of all, my apologies for seeming offensive. I meant that your small social media presence was a positive sign that you were like much of the Appropedia community just trying to find ways to have impact, as opposed to a giant conglomerate bent on only making money. I do not mean that those are the only options, I only meant that you seemed like a real person based on the little that I could see. I understand how it reads offensively, I should have been more clear.
::I did reach out to you a few years ago, via your userpage, and email (if you had one registered), at [[User_talk:Samalmaairgy]]. I am sorry that message did not get to you. We recently updated our email services so that they are less likely to end up in spam. I also just added you on Instagram so that I could alert you to our concerns...and so we could get to know each other a little more and seek synergistic ways to support our efforts. For example, you could definitely add links and information about your sites and project at [[User:Samalmaairgy]].
::You are correct that we do not have a good and clear policy on adding link backs. That said, we strongly encourage value added content to be added to Appropedia instead of just links to the URLs belonging to the poster. Our policy usually has us removing these types of added links. Does that make sense?
::In conclusion, my apologies for any offense. I am glad to have you hear, and to meet you. I know you have been working on this type of stuff for a long time! Please let me know your thoughts.
::Thank you, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 17:49, 19 June 2019 (CDT)


(undent)I have no idea of the way that the Appropedia Foundation finances work, but I assume that large numbers of bots and lots of pages must have an impact on bandwidth and storage costs.  I still think that bad pages have an impact on everything else - so am not really sure there is an alternative to a root-and-branch cull.  It might actually be easier to identify good pages, then improve them and delete everything else, but I could be totally off beam on my understanding of this.  I don't know how the semantic search works - could it give results from wikipedia (or other sources) for subjects where we do not have content? 


I interpret Lonny as saying that pages should either be:
::In response, whether the first concern is adding value to the wiki, or just a method of free self promotion (and possibly also some fanancial gain) is impossible to prove either way. The real question is ''whether these edits have added anything of value to the wiki''. I think since they add zero actual content and are just external links to a site of limited use to readers of this wiki, they merely act to divert traffic away from the wiki... viewers that might otherwise have contributed to the wiki. No such links are provided back to Appropedia from the blog. I agree that to add actual content to the wiki at the same time as linking would be preferable, and a link to the blog from a user page is fine, however if editing is restricted to adding such links with no content, this is questionable. The reason I did not delete all links is because the blog / website linked cannot be said to be purely commercial and is providing some information to the public without any paywall on some pages. Despite the obvious self promotion, I am unsure if those links should be removed. Other pages of product reviews and links to amazon cannot be said to be as useful to readers and should definately be deleted in my opinion. I see that the app to get a quote for solar PV savings seems to have gone (?). Therefore I will let others decide the best course of action here, kind regards, [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 15:54, 20 June 2019 (CDT)
* Project pages by students & others - involving direct experimentation (or other forms of information collection) on a subject directly related to AT
* Descriptive pages by practitioners about how different tech has been used in the field
* Curated general pages linking together these in a format which is readable by someone coming to Appropedia looking for information on that subject


I'd also add
Hello there,
* Curated pages on other subjects, which are not prescriptive, and which signpost to good sources of much more detailed information elsewhere.


It seems to me that the best pages are already arranged like this.  Maybe we just need to get out of the mindset that we are in any way trying to replicate a version of wikipedia and play to our strengths - which are either writing about things we directly know about or providing useful links on subjects where we do not. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 07:53, 14 April 2013 (PDT)
Sam here,


== Editing the main page´s <title> tag to be more descriptive ==
In response to Lonny, Thank you so much for your positive response, I have followed you back on Instagram. I saw your message in my talk page just today, I wish I have read it back then to understand the Appropedia policies better. Thank you for your help and for your supporting words.


Hey folks,
In response to Moribund, I believe I have already replied to your concern about my contributions in my first response. and regarding the ad at the bottom of the posts. Pardon me,  it is silly to think that it was removed due to this discussion. It just happened to be good timing that is all. The ad was removed due to issues in the code, It is a temporary removal and it will be added again once the problem is solved.


Just went to bookmark appropedia at my hostel's public use computer, and realized the default title was just Appropedia. I'd like to propose something like what Slashdot.org has, maybe "Appropedia - A Sustainability wiki" or something similarly informative.
There is something that worth mentioning, I get zero traffic and zero profit from Appropedia, there might be literally 1 or 2 visitors a month from Appropedia to my website. Nothing much that made you so bothered about my 'financial gain' because of my links in Appropedia. So again I am not benefiting from this in one way or another. And to not bother you again, I made it clear that my contributions whether in the form of providing raw information or adding external links to Appropedia pages will be stopped. and I will keep my contributions in my user page only according to Lonny's advice.
I decided I didn't even realize the site's quick descriptor/tag at all, and a search on the front page didn't see it. A second skim produces a line that doesn't stand out (in terms of font size especially) from the rest of the page "Sharing knowledge to build rich, sustainable lives.".  I would suggest something replace, or combine with, 'welcome to appropedia.'


hope this first entry finds all well! :)
Thank you all!
--[[User:Ajay|Ajay]] (aka [http://AToTheT.orG/ @]) 17:16, 13 April 2013 (PDT)
::I only see external links no other content. As I stated earlier, intentions are essentially irrelevant, the issues is whether the links are of value to the wiki, and if not then they should be removed imo. [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 02:25, 22 June 2019 (CDT)
:::As no-one else has expressed any new opinions on this, I'll remove any links that are too commercial. I feel a good rule of thumb for this is ELs to pages dedicated to product reviews and amazon links should be removed, whereas pages of general informative content might stay. I'll start work on this in a few days unless anyone else posts. [[User:Moribund|Moribund]] ([[User talk:Moribund|talk]]) 11:43, 7 July 2019 (CDT)


:Hi Ajay,
== Climate change as an area in the lh menu? ==
:Thanks for the bookmark and the sound SEO advice!
:--[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] 17:31, 13 April 2013 (PDT)


== Removal of weapons pages ==
With the rapid recent rise of [[Extinction Rebellion]] worldwide, I'm wondering if it might be a smart move to list Climate change (or similar) as an area in the left hand column menu. This might attract more editors to Appropedia? We could start with the [[:Category:Climate change]] which has a similar number of articles to some other areas. Then if enough support collaborate to develop a portal? What do you think? [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 14:13, 19 October 2019 (UTC)


I am just recording a discussion we've just had about the removal of [[Black powder]]
:Just seeing this now. I think it is a brilliant idea. Clearly most of our work ties directly to, and is driven by, climate change...making that more clear seems like a good call. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 20:51, 7 November 2019 (UTC)


do we need a page on making gunpowder? seems unlikely to me. Joeturner 01:59, 17 April 2013 (PDT)
:: Great, done the first bit, will get round to working on drafting a Portal soon, but of course anyone can start on this if you like. [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 09:25, 8 November 2019 (UTC)
:Useful when the zombie apocalypse comes? Seriously though, the zombie thing is sometimes used as a useful metaphor for collapse....but I'm not comfortable with actively supporting the idea of making and using weapons. A survivalist might say that weapons are essential for self-defence, in some contexts, and they'd be right - but I'm still uneasy about it. --Chriswaterguy 05:29, 17 April 2013 (PDT)
::Apart from anything else, I'm not sure if we have anyone with the skills to tell whether these recipes would work - and I'm not offering to test it. If we don't know for sure, I think we have to treat this as untested and dangerous. And I really don't think we need to tell anyone how to make explosives, if they really want to know they can find the information someplace else. Joeturner 05:32, 17 April 2013 (PDT)
:::Very good points. I say delete, but preserve this conversation somewhere (village pump?) --Chriswaterguy 05:49, 17 April 2013 (PDT)  


The page is now removed.  Suggest all other weapons etc pages are removed for similar reasons. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 06:05, 17 April 2013 (PDT)
==Untitled==
THius is hard to edit we dont know what to do {{unsigned|Cabskie}}
:How can I help? [[User:Koavf|Koavf]] ([[User talk:Koavf|talk]]) 02:57, 9 December 2019 (UTC)


:Support. --[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 13:46, 21 April 2013 (PDT)
==Appropedia's rules and bugs==
Hello there! I am considering using Appropedia for posting information, references and links on climate change and related activism. I would be interested to have some more information on Appropedia's rules, which I cannot easily find on the [[Appropedia:About|About pages]].


:How about we list such pages here on the village pump, and then propose deletion of them? I think I'll support deletion, but I'd like us to know which pages we're deciding about. Thanks. --[[User:Chriswaterguy|Chriswaterguy]] 10:01, 24 April 2013 (PDT)
Wikipedia's rules on [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view neutrality] and [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability notability] would prevent posting some useful information there, and this is why Appropedia may be a useful complement. However, I wonder what replaces these two rules on Appropedia? My impression is that Appropedia is not yet developed enough for having formal rules, is that correct?
::They're in the list of 'pages which should not be on Appropedia' above, Chris.  I deleted two pages with gun designs, one which specifically relates to an electric baton and blackpowder.  There are still several others in that list which we need to decide about. [[User:Joeturner|Joeturner]] 10:14, 24 April 2013 (PDT)


== mediawiki 1.20.4 ==
Moreover I have a technical question. Appropedia was "database locked" for a few days recently, with little information on when that situation started and how long it lasted. Over the last few years, how often did such situations occur? Which percentage of the time is Appropedia fully functional? [[User:Shapoklyak|Shapoklyak]] ([[User talk:Shapoklyak|talk]]) 08:46, 2 January 2020 (UTC)


hi could you upgrade your mediawiki from 1.17.0 to 1.20.4 please [[Special:Contributions/86.139.246.76|86.139.246.76]] 13:25, 21 April 2013 (PDT)
:Hi [[User:Shapoklyak|Shapoklyak]], hopefully others might answer your questions more directly, but just wanted to say that "information, references and links on climate change and related activism" sounds good to me. As you can see from our [[:Category:Climate change]] we have so far 80 pages or more on climate change topics, and content related to activism within the [[:Category:Climate action]]. Browsing these may help give a feel of what we have here so far. Hope that is of some help, and please ask again if I can help further, [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 16:52, 2 January 2020 (UTC)


== php MySQL update  ==
::Some other links more directly related to your questions: [[Help:Contributing content]], [[Appropedia:Policies]] - includes notes on 'Neutral Point of View' - more at [[Appropedia:Neutral point of view]], [[Appropedia:Pillars and values]], & more via [[:Category:Appropedia guidelines]], [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 17:09, 2 January 2020 (UTC)


hi could you please update php from 5.3.13 to 5.4.14 and MySQL from 5.1.53 to 5.6.11 please [[Special:Contributions/86.139.246.76|86.139.246.76]] 13:30, 21 April 2013 (PDT)
:::Thanks a lot [[User:Philralph|Philralph]]! I had failed to find this information, this is exactly what I was looking for. [[User:Shapoklyak|Shapoklyak]] ([[User talk:Shapoklyak|talk]]) 13:37, 3 January 2020 (UTC)


== Appropedia:User experience/MainPageRedesign5 ready ==
:I might be able to explain. Our server seemed to be compromised for a few days, but it was solved by [[User:Roger|Roger]] who was coincidentally working on the upgrade of Appropedia. We expect the site to be fully functional now, but please let us know if you find anything unusual. --[[User:Emilio|Emilio]] ([[User talk:Emilio|talk]]) 18:20, 2 January 2020 (UTC)


I think [[Appropedia:User experience/MainPageRedesign5]] is ready to be put into the main page because the improvement is that there are more colour to make it look nice it include a social bar and improves the desgn [[Special:Contributions/86.139.246.76|86.139.246.76]] 13:55, 21 April 2013 (PDT)
::Thank you for this explanation of the recent bug. Still I would like to know how frequently such technical problems occur. Is there a log of technical issues and notifications? [[User:Shapoklyak|Shapoklyak]] ([[User talk:Shapoklyak|talk]]) 13:41, 3 January 2020 (UTC)
:::Hi Shapoklyak,
:::In the last 10 years, we have had less than 10 days of locked databases. This happens due to a DDOS, hacking, or massive spam attack. We are quite proud of our uptime over the last 13 years. Does that answer your question? Thanks! --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 22:35, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
::::Yes it does! Thanks. [[User:Shapoklyak|Shapoklyak]] ([[User talk:Shapoklyak|talk]]) 12:54, 5 January 2020 (UTC)


== NMC Horizon Report > 2013 Higher Education Edition  ==
== A recent revert ==


"The [http://www.nmc.org/ New Media Consortium] (NMC) is a community of hundreds of leading universities, colleges, museums, and research centers. The NMC stimulates and furthers the exploration and use of new media and technologies for learning and creative expression. All content Creative Commons.
I'm copying the following post from [[User talk:Auri]], in case [[User:Auri]], formerly 'Dove' (?) wishes to make a case in support of his/her edits [[User:Philralph|Philralph]] ([[User talk:Philralph|talk]]) 13:13, 18 January 2020 (UTC)


"The [http://www.nmc.org/publications/2013-horizon-report-higher-ed NMC Horizon Report > 2013 Higher Education Edition] is a collaborative effort between the NMC and the EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative (ELI), an EDUCAUSE Program.
"Hi [[User:Auri]], thanks for your message regarding your edits to [[Inspiring quotes 2]]. I see you also similarly edited [[Wendell Berry]]. I have reverted these edits and will explain why: whilst some of the edits may have been helpful, the majority seemed to be destructive. This is because the original format of a quote is important in conveying what the author intended. For example a coma, which some might find unnecessary may have been deliberately included to signify a pause during a speech. Best not to over concentrate on pernickety detail, as this might seem a distraction, but to instead concentrate on positive and substantive edits. I see you created pages for [[Greta Thunberg]] and [[Naomi Klein]]. I also see that you have contributed before using the username 'Dove' (?) I'm copying this post to [[Appropedia:Village Pump]] in case you wish to make a case in support of your edits."
"The tenth edition describes annual findings from the NMC Horizon Project, a decade-long research project designed to identify and describe emerging technologies likely to have an impact on learning, teaching, and creative inquiry in higher education. Six emerging technologies are identified across three adoption horizons over the next one to five years, as well as key trends and challenges expected to continue over the same period, giving campus leaders and practitioners a valuable guide for strategic technology planning."


<div style="float:left; margin-right:5em">
:Thanks. --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 01:31, 19 January 2020 (UTC)
The six emerging technologies to watch include:
* Near-term horizon
** Massively open online courses (MOOCs)
** Tablet computing
* Mid-term horizon
** Games and gamification
** Learning analytics
* Far-term horizon
** 3D printing
** Wearable technology
</div>


[[Category:Videos]] [[Category:Appropriate technology videos]] [[Category:Knowledge videos]] {{#widget:YouTube|id=qjUtoZllJ1I}}
== Suggested for deletion ==


--[[User:RichardF|RichardF]] 10:02, 24 April 2013 (PDT)
I am suggesting to delete [[Global Village Construction Kit]]. This page is a little less obvious if it should be deleted for developed. I would also love to hear from any people involved with the Global Village Construction Set. Thank, --[[User:Lonny|Lonny]] ([[User talk:Lonny|talk]]) 01:40, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

Revision as of 01:40, 19 January 2020

Appropedia:Village pump/Introduction

A plan for Appropedia to go places in 2013/14

Here's a stab at a strategic plan - what do you think? --Chriswaterguy 00:28, 19 September 2013 (PDT)

I think its a good start. I added some comments on the Talk page there. --PatSunter (talk) 19:08, 12 March 2014 (PDT)

Thanks and good luck

I'm outa here, folks. Good luck with everything. Joe

We've chatted by email, but again, many thanks for your great work, Joe. I wish you all the best with your next adventures. --Chriswaterguy 17:53, 14 October 2013 (PDT)

Pages that advertise green businesses

I removed the {{delete|advertising}} from Beyond Building Energy. We have been allowing sustainable businesses to have pages about themselves. I like having such pages, especially where they have information that might be valuable to a reader, but we need to work out clearer limits. E.g. is Beyond Building Energy the sort of page we want to have on Appropedia? --Chriswaterguy (talk) 21:35, 19 November 2013 (PST)

  • Maybe there is a need for a template for sustainability-oriented businesses or organisations? I.E. not a delete template, but something to the effect that it is a business, Appropedia does not endorse businesses or their products, but allows relevant ones a page, so the reader should do their own research etc. I also think its ok, as long as they don't try to start inserting lots of "advertorial" style content in more Encyclopaedic pages (an issue we had a while back on Public transport). --PatSunter (talk) 21:06, 14 March 2014 (PDT)
Thanks Pat, good approach, I think. --Chriswaterguy (talk) 04:58, 17 April 2014 (PDT)
Yes, good approach. Here's another wiki's page on the topic: [1]? Pashley (talk) 10:57, 17 April 2014 (PDT)

spammness

Hey I am sorry but I face the spam problem too. I've tried change the content of the page Cshr25, and I was sure I got logged in. No idea why it treated me as a spammer.
I couldn't even leave a message on the supporter's page. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Cshr25 , 21 January 2014

(For the record, this was resolved. --Chriswaterguy (talk) 04:46, 17 April 2014 (PDT))

Exemplar city?

An article [2] on work in Huntsville, Alabama on tornado resistance, "micro-grid" energy sources, sustainable tech, ... Pashley (talk) 11:18, 15 April 2014 (PDT)

That's very cool! I wonder what it would take to find students interested in developing pages on this. This touches on a bunch of important topics. --Chriswaterguy (talk) 04:36, 17 April 2014 (PDT)

Solar at Canadian latitudes?

An Indian reservation with a solar project. This is a fairly isolated community; I do not think it is on the electric grid or that it is reachable by road. It is not in the far North, only Northern Ontario so laititude below 60. Pashley (talk) 19:59, 17 April 2014 (PDT)

New type of axe for splitting wood

Where does this fit in? Inventor & press make some rather strong claims for it. Pashley (talk) 16:03, 22 April 2014 (PDT)

Content types

I can tell there's been a lot of effort to organize Appropedia by topics/ subject matter. But I'm wondering if there's been much in the way of organizing by content type? Appropedia's content is much broader than traditional wikis. From what I can see there's: 1) articles, 2) manuals/ how-tos, 3) specific project/ experiment write-ups, and 4) raw data. Maybe we could have a convo about if this kind of organization would be helpful for users and if so how to do it. --Ethan (talk) 19:06, 22 April 2014 (PDT)

Agreed - a good start would be clarifying the exact classifications for pages we have. "Designs" seems like another type of content, but perhaps these will fit into projects or how-tos. --Chriswaterguy (talk) 02:00, 23 April 2014 (PDT)
Another kind of content is essays. These may be high in narrative or experience, e.g. Reversing Soil Degradation of Agricultural Lands. These are about the topic, but probably should stand alone, separate from a topic page. I'd like to have a naming convention, so they can be easily recognised. Should they start with "Essay:"? Should they be capitalised? --Chriswaterguy (talk) 05:28, 21 August 2014 (PDT)
As I was organizing the permaculture category, I realized that designs are an essential area to work on. Perhaps we could use custom namespaces. I see that there's already Original: , but that seems to have more to do with attribution than content type. Another option might just be to use categories, but I don't know if it would make site navigation feel messy to have content types and subject matter organized that way. --Ethan (talk) 10:18, 17 May 2015 (PDT)

Food crops & nitrogen-fixing bacteria

Three teenaged Irish girls got the top prize at a Google Science Fair with work that looks rather interesting: http://www.independent.ie/business/technology/news/irish-teenagers-bag-top-prize-at-google-science-fair-2014-30607710.html

Is anyone interested in a guide to Greenwashing?

I would like to make a page on the practice of companies presenting themselves as environmentally friendly when they are not in reality (a.k.a. "greenwashing") but I'm not sure if it's something the community is interested in: this isn't a guide for a specific project or proposal for a kind of technology. Is this fit for Appropedia? Koavf (talk) 10:43, 7 October 2014 (PDT)

I think it's a good fit for Appropedia.
(Searching…) Aha – we have a page called greenwash. What do you think of moving that to greenwashing and developing it further? --Chriswaterguy (talk) 16:07, 7 October 2014 (PDT)
Ha. I didn't even think to search greenwash. I'll see if I can add to that. Thanks. Koavf (talk) 10:12, 9 October 2014 (PDT)

Any overlap here?

Survivor Library, for tech that might work after collapse of civilisation. e.g. An early 20th century text on X-rays, the idea being that with that plus basic electrical & glass-blowing skills you might be able to build a medically useful machine from scratch.

This is not closely related to anything we do here, but it might include some books of interest. It seems worth a link, but where? Pashley (talk) 08:35, 28 October 2014 (PDT)


Cool! Probably we want a Template:Tlc, or Template:Tlc? We don't have a lot of content directly addressing this, but it's definitely on topic. (Personally, I think the chances of modern society really collapsing are very low. However, I do believe in being prepared, and that compiling the info has other benefits.)
So, where... an initial article could be called Recovering from collapse, say? Just a thought. Be bold :). --Chriswaterguy (talk) 20:16, 29 October 2014 (PDT)
Love it. I often think of appropriate technologies as epi-apocalyptic technologies that we build in the race against collapse. The bonus is that if we do not make it in time, the technology knowledge can be there for the rebuild/re-imagine. --Lonny (talk) 21:29, 29 October 2014 (PDT)
From the looks of it, the content of the site is mostly public domain manuals/ how-tos from the 19th-early 20th century. Certainly there's a lot of commonalities between what people were doing then and the current approaches of appropriate tech and the transition movement. But there's also plenty of "bad ideas" from back then (like just about any application of lead). That aside, how could these two sites interact? Appropedia seems to be pretty averse to PDFs, which is Survivor Library's bread and butter. For the present SL can be used to identify content areas we're lacking here (like beekeeping) and linking to those that are covered here. --Ethan (talk) 09:38, 17 May 2015 (PDT)

Media idea

Hi been a long time.. just checking in to say that I've been thinking in a similar way about this, thinking that there are few forms of media which are written as if collapse is a real possibility (and, having been to a few academic conferences about this in recent months, I think it is a lot more likely than many might think) - or even if it isn't, talking as if the changes we need to make to our lifestyles in the face of climate change are real, serious and urgent. Which, I think, probably amount to the same kind of thing. I was even vaguely contemplating starting a wikinews clone to start putting out news written on that basis. Oh yes, I forgot to say that since I've been away, I've kinda become a journalist.. as you do! Joeturner (talk) 09:20, 10 November 2014 (PST)

Hi Joe. Thumbs up for all those thoughts.
Could Appropedia be the platform, or at least an incubator, for your news site idea? (Side note: "Collapsonomics" springs to mind for the economics section of such a project.) --Chriswaterguy (talk) 14:48, 10 November 2014 (PST)
Hi Chris - well I'm really throwing it out for discussion rather than suggesting that I have a 'ready made' idea. There are significant problems with the model from wikinews which makes it very bland and has a very tortuous process to get to publication - I am not sure that is really necessary. Also there is no need to feel pressure to generate a lot of daily content. So I guess I'm thinking something which is a bit more than a blog, but a lot less work than a full news site - perhaps including interviews with people involved in relevant stuff (including but not exclusively appropredia projects), discussion of relevant issues etc. It could, perhaps, be intended to be a monthly mag (newsletter or whatever) but with articles coming out as and when during that time.
I think it could work as opensource - providing everyone understood some basic rules and there were some protections to prevent people getting misquoted etc. I suppose I see it a bit more like an open review system to improve content which is eventually 'published' (and no longer open for editing). Dunno, just a thought really. Joeturner (talk) 02:41, 11 November 2014 (PST)
"I'm thinking something which is a bit more than a blog, but a lot less work than a full news site - perhaps including interviews with people involved in relevant stuff (including but not exclusively appropredia projects), discussion of relevant issues etc." – I like it. To do it in a collaborative way means that an existing site (with lots of suitable users already registered) would be a good place, but maybe that's my bias. To do it in an open source way, MediaWiki has some advantages.
In any case it sounds like something that I'd like to support, partly because it's a good idea and partly because I know that you're smart and no-nonsense. --Chriswaterguy (talk) 16:16, 24 November 2014 (PST)
Sounds like a potentially great project, Joe. I've been watching the collapse discourse for awhile. What info sources there are leave a lot to be desired. The main thing I'd like to see is something with a lot more fact-based approach. There are some staid and insightful media like John Michael Greer's blog and the C-Realm podcast, but there's also a lot of tin foil types. --Ethan (talk) 09:54, 17 May 2015 (PDT)

Farm Hack

Farm Hack looks like prime partners for Appropedia - we should be encouraging cross pollination. -- Joshua (talk) 06:38, 6 February 2015 (PST)

Thanks Joshua. I'll drop them a line. --Chriswaterguy (talk) 05:04, 7 February 2015 (PST)

LH side bar link for sustainable community action

There are now quite a few (c. 300) pages in the Category:Sustainable community action. It'd be good if we could have some kind of link from the left hand menu (just to Sustainable community action, the sca main page), perhaps near the collaborators box? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Philralph, 17 February 2015‎

Thanks Philralph – you're doing great work. I added it under "areas", as "Community action" so that it fits. ("Collaborators" was intended for external partners, so it didn't seem right.) How is that? --Chriswaterguy (talk) 15:16, 23 February 2015 (PST)
Excellent! Thanks Chris Philralph (talk) 01:27, 24 February 2015 (PST)

Translation students on Wikipedia

Sharing this link because it may be relevant to Appropedia and Ekopedia, as we work to connect the different language wikis: Translation students embrace Wikipedia assignments, but find user interface frustrating. --Chriswaterguy (talk) 04:44, 24 Februa ry 2015 (PST)

What's the progress on that project? I'd be glad to help port stuff once I'm finished with Permaculture.info. Unfortunately, I don't know French, but it looks like there's lots of great English-language content and images. --Ethan (talk) 09:17, 17 May 2015 (PDT)

Self-healing concrete?

Slashdot points to an article on bio-concrete; it contains bacteria which fix cracks. Pashley (talk) 10:09, 15 May 2015 (PDT)

Year of Soil & Light

This is a bit late as the year's almost half over, but it would be cool if we could do something for the International Year of Soil and Light (as declared by the UN). Perhaps some kind of work party or months-long effort to add relevant content. At the very least it could get a mention on the front page. --Ethan (talk) 10:03, 17 May 2015 (PDT)

Oops, I haven't been checking this page, sorry! That's a good idea. Perhaps there are existing pages that could be highlighted also? --Chriswaterguy (talk) 05:28, 12 June 2015 (PDT)

Instructables

As J.M.Pearce mentioned, Instructables has some material that could be ported here. But there's a snag. If I understand right, Appropedia avoids BY-NC-SA material. That license appears to be the default on Instructables, so the majority of content is licensed that way. I want there to be a quick way to look up BY-SA content, but I'm stumped. CC's own search utility doesn't include Instructables. Trying to combine a reverse image search of the BY-SA image combined with the string "site:instructables.com" didn't work. Any suggestions? I don't want to waste time going through stuff we can't take. (Incidentally, I was reminded of the website's existence by finding a book of "off-grid" projects compiled by the site's founder. Is he violating his own users' licenses!?) --Ethan (talk) 21:56, 20 May 2015 (PDT)

It turns out there is alttext on the license images. So you can enter the search string "site:instructables.com attribution sharealike -noncommercial" to get (mostly) relevant results. I created the template {{Instructables}} to provide attribution for imported material. TCMTECH dripper irrigation for rainbarrel is an example of what an imported page can look like. It might also be nice to notify the content creator.

Side note: There's been some discussion discussion about CC license violation 1, 2 --Ethan (talk) 13:04, 21 May 2015 (PDT)

Hey, nice effort with the "site:instructables.com attribution sharealike -noncommercial" search.
Yeah, it's unfortunate about the incompatible licenses. What we are always able to do, regardless of license or copyright, is post a summary or paraphrase together with a link. I think that's still very useful, as it becomes information that can be found by browsing Appropedia (e.g. going through the pages in a category), even if the full version must be viewed elsewhere. --Chriswaterguy (talk) 05:26, 12 June 2015 (PDT)

Articles about individuals - need guidelines

There were a couple of articles about individuals in mainspace, that were a bit promotional in nature. That's not fundamentally a bad thing, but it's not what Appropedia mainspace is for, I think. So, I've moved them to the userspace of the user that created the pages.

We want to be clear and consistent, so my suggested guideline is that articles about people need to be notable in some way. If they meet Wikipedia's notability criteria and they're relevant to Appropedia's themes, they can be in mainspace.

We can be more flexible than Wikipedia, though, e.g. by counting popular sustainability/development blogs as "reliable sources" that count towards notability.

What are your thoughts? --Chriswaterguy (talk) 05:43, 12 June 2015 (PDT)

I've been thinking about this a little bit, but not about the notability aspect. There's several individuals and their work that I'd like to profile. In many cases the individual is more or less synonymous with the organization they head or the technique they developed. Sepp Holzer is a perfect example which already exists on the wiki. I can't imagine anyone whose biographical details will be sufficient (for the purpose of this wiki) to justify their own article. --Ethan (talk)


Hi Appropedia, I have a question, and have looked around a bounch and am still not sure where to post it. First, I so appreciate that you have made this website exist! It is of such great service to the world, and has so much potential to do even more!

I would like to share resources that involve individual's discoveries.

1) is it OK to share about any one who is already dead? 2) is it OK to share about people who are living by putting a link to a third party? if that third party is a professional certifying body that might get into a gray area of promotion. I also do not know most of the people who work in the field, but the field itself should have the right to articulate who belongs in it. Also, attribution for the general category should be given (founder of the certifying body, called ISMETA, whose name escapes me, coined the term "somatic education" and "movement education" which can cover multiple methods of teaching movement. 3) ISMETA also includes movement _therapy_ which is not, by its nature, open source, as far as I understand it (unless you would consider someone offering to be a physical therapist without any training and claiming to heal conditions to be using material they've read in an open-source fashion). How do I handle this? is it enough to simply give a disclaimer?

Thanks! --JoshuaDM

Hi Joshua. There's no problem with sharing about someone who is already dead, and providing a suitable link is always helpful. A verifying body could make sense.
An article being to promotional wouldn't ever be about a single link - it's the overall emphasis and balance of the article.
It's fine to share about things that are not open source, as long as the text is released under our open content license.
I hope that helps! --Chriswaterguy (talk)

Thanks, Chriswaterguy. I will attempt to conform to these guidelines, and if I make any mistakes please let me know so I can correct them. Thanks. --Joshua

Nominating Ethan for admin

Ethan has been flagging spam, and being an admin would let him work on this more effectively. He's been an enthusiastic and trustworthy contributor here, so I see no reason not to make him an admin. Support, oppose or have another comment? Please comment below. --Chriswaterguy (talk) 06:20, 12 June 2015 (PDT)

I'd be glad to help out. :) --Ethan (talk) 19:35, 12 June 2015 (PDT)
Support, Philralph (talk) 01:55, 24 June 2015 (PDT)
Great. Thank you Ethan, welcome to adminship. You should see new tools on pages (such as the ability to delete directly). You should also see new tools at Special:SpecialPages, such as mass delete (use with care). Please feel free to ask whenever you have a question. Thank you for all you do. --Lonny (talk) 17:58, 19 July 2015 (PDT)
Thanks everyone. I tried out the delete function on the lastest spam articles. What's the standard procedure for the spambot-created users? I'll take a closer look at Special:SpecialPages; there's a lot there. Any recommended regular mainenance tasks? --Ethan (talk) 13:15, 31 July 2015 (PDT)

Lightweight structural panels 3D print

Think of a cross between milk crates and giant legos. Now build a house with it. If you're actively intrigued about how to address this challenge with a 3D printer, please see http://www.appropedia.org/Lightweight_structural_panels_3D_print because I really don't know much about how to go about it. I only have an idea with potential.

top menu link for Community action

Can we have a link in the menu that goes across the top of pages for Community action (as in the areas of the side bar)? I've moved 'Sustainable community action' to Community action for sustainability, which fits better with the link, and is perhaps a slightly less opaque name (plus am making corresponding changes to category names, etc), Cheers, Philralph (talk) 08:21, 13 August 2015 (PDT)

Also would be good to have links to Community action for sustainability or Community action on Welcome to Appropedia/Categories & Appropedia:CategoryTree Philralph (talk) 07:45, 16 August 2015 (PDT)

I bet most-all of Category:Taking action could be merged into CAS, and then CAS could replace it on the Category Tree. --Ethan (talk) 11:40, 17 August 2015 (PDT)

commercial article?

I'd like for someone to take a look at The Economics of UK's Residential Solar Power and tell me what you think about it. It's been written by, and links to, a website that compares different solarvoltaic installation services in the UK. I'm not sure whether this crosses a line in terms of advertising content. It does appear to offer some useful, if unsourced, information. I'm sure at least part of the motivation for creating the article was for SEO reasons, but I don't think that's sufficient reason to remove it if they're also adding substantive content to Appropedia. Thoughts? --Ethan (talk) 11:52, 17 August 2015 (PDT)

Question on Naming Conventions

Was fleshing out an index on my new project page and wanted to ask about the naming conventions for internal page links. First, is it OK to use separate pages for sub-sections of a project or is it preferable to only use sub-sections on the one project page? Is there a convention for naming internal pages and links so they relate just to a parent project?

Thank you. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by EricHunting, 23 August 2015

My opinion is 1) Go for it. If it turns out there's not much substance on a particular page, it can easily be merged into the parent page. 2) Check out Help:Page naming. I would title the pages something like Open House Fabrication, Open House Budget and so on. --Ethan (talk) 12:16, 23 August 2015 (PDT)
Agree with Ethan. Unless they're short sections, it's often better to have separate pages, that link to each other.
Having the patent project as part of the pagename is a good idea, so visitors can quickly see what it's about. --Chriswaterguy (talk) 06:54, 24 August 2015 (PDT)
Thanks for the suggestions. I'll give that a try. --EricHunting (talk) 06:58, 25 August 2015 (PDT)

Ekopedia status

It appears that Ekopedia is down. Are the site owners/ admins aware of the outage? --Ethan (talk) 11:47, 27 August 2015 (PDT)

Yes. There are people working hard on it. The technical details are quite difficult and they could use some additional help. Please contact User:Chriswaterguy if you know some great multilanguage wiki people that could help. In the mean time, I am making a temporary landing page at Ekopedia. Please feel free to edit with more direction. Thank you, --Lonny (talk)

A Two-Stage, Oscillating Swingset Pump

By swinging in this 'swing/penduluum' the other end of the lever oscillates up and down.

This then operates a vertical rod which, with a simple piston air compressor (or water pump), stores compressed air in an insulated air scuba tank, or pumps water in an efficient and relaxing way.

The heat from compression stays put, and gives more umPH to run two air pistons, which are located on-board the teeter-totter 'chariot'! (Now stationary for water pumping.)

Then, off it goes with a thousand lb. load of goods to a destination. Truly a dual-purpose vehicle!

These two air pistons then power the wheels, to assist the runner/driver with getting easily around a festival area at 10mph cruising speed...with a thousand pounds of people!

So, the penduluum , that is in the 'Two-Stage Oscillating Lever' invention, now becomes a...children's swing air compressor/water pump!

http://darinselby.1hwy.com/2stageswinglever03.html

Am I allowed to start pages in languages other than English - Español - Deutsch - Français - Italiano - Português - Kiswahili ?

I want to develop articles in my native tongue, to reach out the locals. This would also give a platform for my language writings to focus on green technology, green ways etc. So am I allowed to simply write articles in my language? IKHazarika (talk) 00:44, 16 September 2015 (PDT)

Hi, IKHazarika. Yes, we welcome content in other languages. Please refer to Appropedia:Languages. --Ethan (talk) 02:08, 18 September 2015 (PDT)

Duplicate originals

I've been going over the website with a fine-tooth comb looking for things that need to be cleaned up. Most issues I've found have trivial fixes, but here's one that's a little more complicated. Several original content pages dating back to 2006 have duplicate pages. In each case they have their own separate edit histories. See: http://www.appropedia.org/index.php?title=Special%3ASearch&search=%28original%29&fulltext=Search . Duplicates for each can be found as both XYZ_(original) and Original:XYZ. I'd be glad to merge these articles, if I can get some guidance on the best way to do that. --Ethan (talk) 22:05, 26 September 2015 (PDT)

Proposal for mass deletion

There was a certain user who copied a lot of templates and other content over from Wikipedia about 2 1/2 years ago. Most to all of it seems to be unnecessary to Appropedia, at least at this stage in its development. For example, there are several templates related to news. While Philralph has been adding news to the relevant location pages on CAS pages, there's not multiple news stories coming up every day to make those templates usable. Also there's not a large enough userbase here to update them. Other templates are just outside of the purview of this wiki. Further, they're really cluttering up the category tree. Therefore, I'd like to go through and just get rid of the majority of it. There's probably a few things that might possibly be used in the future which could be shelved in the incubator, and I'm willing to go digging through it all. --Ethan (talk) 05:25, 30 September 2015 (PDT)

I went ahead with this. There was at least one template that was deleted in error, so if anyone notices something that looks broken please inform me or another admin. I changed my mind about a news template (see below). --Ethan (talk) 02:32, 2 December 2015 (PST)

Porting from PermaWiki

I received Graham Burnett's blessing to port PermaWiki's content here. He was actually surprised it hadn't been done already. Because of long-term interest in PermaWiki here, and both sites using CC-BY-SA I anticipate no roadblocks. I set up the infrastructure already; ported pages can be appended with {{attrib permawiki}}, which will automatically place them in the PermaWiki category. The full list of mainspace pages can be found here. I'll get started on this in earnest once I finish porting the Permaculture.info content (shouldn't be long, once I resolve access issues). --Ethan (talk) 09:44, 5 October 2015 (PDT)

Excellent, thank you! --Chriswaterguy (talk) 18:12, 27 November 2015 (PST)

OpenStreetMap

I'd like to propose a new feature: compatibility with OpenStreetMap. First, it's collaborative and open-licensed (CC-BY-SA), consistent with Appropedia. Second, (in my opinion) the map quality is often better than proprietary map services. More info here: http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/MediaWiki_extension --Ethan (talk) 20:19, 25 October 2015 (PDT)

Hi Ethan,
We are working on a site upgrade as we speak. Once we are up to date, I would love to explore this extension. I love OpenStreetMap. Thanks, --Lonny (talk) 20:01, 2 December 2015 (PST)
Wikivoyage has two types of map, both derived from OSM. A "dynamic map" has OSM data overlaid with any WV listings (hotels, etc.) that include lat/long co-ords; almost every destination has one of these & there's a template to make inserting one easy. Some also have a "static map", user-created. Pashley (talk) 15:46, 17 February 2017 (PST)

Felicity Tepper for admin

I nominate Felicity Tepper (talk · contribs) for an admin role. Felicity has been making many valuable contributions and also tagging spam pages for deletion.

Felicity, do you accept? --Chriswaterguy (talk)

I've been reading through the admin materials and links, to be sure of the responsibilities involved. If everyone else is happy for me to facilitate in this way, then I'd be happy to accept. Felicity (talk) 13:20, 28 November 2015 (PST)

Any words of support, any questions or concerns? --Chriswaterguy (talk) 18:09, 27 November 2015 (PST)

I support! --Lonny (talk) 18:24, 27 November 2015 (PST)
Me too! Philralph (talk) 02:42, 28 November 2015 (PST)
Support. Felicity has been adding a lot of great content and tagging spam. --Ethan (talk) 17:31, 28 November 2015 (PST)
Woohoo. Thank you Felicity, you are now an admin! --Lonny (talk) 19:41, 1 December 2015 (PST)

Thanks everyone, looking forward to helping out and continuing to learn. Cheers. Felicity (talk) 23:03, 1 December 2015 (PST)

Main page redesign proposal

I'd like to suggest some design changes for the front page. My draft redesign is here. There's two main things I'd like to see:

1) Reduce size of header and announcements. Right now when I load the main page these two items take up all of the space that isn't dedicated to the top & side bars. I'm not very experienced in graphic design, but to my mind that's a waste of some valuable real estate.

2) Add a news section. Phil has been adding news items to Community action for sustainability on a daily basis. I think bringing them to the front page, and putting them next to the more static content on the front page offers a nice balance. It would do a better job of highlighting the breadth and depth of material covered on Appropedia.

I think both of these would spur more interest and participation from visitors to the site. Note that my draft has some issues: the left and right columns can become unaligned depending on what which random selections load. The Highlighted Projects section would also need to be edited to fit the left column. --Ethan (talk) 21:34, 29 November 2015 (PST)

I'd love to see a redesign. I'll have a closer look at your draft later (getting to work now) but:
  • The part of the header that lists all the topic areas ("Appropriate technology • Construction • " etc) was an experiment, I think, and it isn't necessary as we have sidebar navigation and a search bar. We can remove it and see how that goes. In fact... Yes! (If that turns out to be unpopular, any admin can revert, here: MediaWiki:Sitenotice.)
  • News section would be excellent - the continual activity that's been happening on Appropedia means that we can keep that fresh.
Thanks! --Chriswaterguy (talk) 14:42, 30 November 2015 (PST)
This is looking good. Is there any way to bring the highlighted project higher. I feel like projects are the core of Appropedia and it would be cool to have it above the fold. Either way, I think it looks better as you have it and would be happy have you implement it. Eventually we will have staff for some awesome UX. In the mean time, I am glad that we can all make it better. While you are at it, can you:
Thanks! --Lonny (talk) 18:24, 30 November 2015 (PST)

I don't see a big conceptual difference between "Community action news" and "Hot topics / In the news." Perhaps the items can be combined into one section or one section with two parts. I put together a sample layout --> here <-- to show how "Community action news" could be incorporated into the Main Page, while still keeping the "Highlighted project" near the top. --RichardF (talk) 06:43, 2 December 2015 (PST)

Hot Topics/In The News is more focused on the work of Appropedians, while Community Action News focuses on the work people are doing in communities around the world. Hot Topics/In The News is closer in content to the Appropedia blog. --Ethan (talk) 01:02, 4 December 2015 (PST)
That sounds like a reason to keep them distinct but not necessarily separate in general locations on the page. If you all need any more help with page layouts, let me know. --RichardF (talk) 06:41, 4 December 2015 (PST)

Hi all, it'd be good to take up Ethan's suggestion of getting some Community Action News into the main page. RichardF's general locations on the page looks good to me, but there seemed too much text on one band (row). A way round this might be to incorporate Selected Quote into one of the columns (for me adds to readability) example here. What do you all think? Philralph (talk) 10:52, 7 January 2016 (PST)

Nominating Philralph for admin

I nominate Philralph (talk · contribs) for an admin role. Philralph has been very active, especially in building the many, many pages on sustainable community action..

Philralph, do you accept? --Chriswaterguy (talk)

Yes, thank you --Philralph (talk) 07:16, 2 December 2015 (PST)
I second that nomination! --Lonny (talk) 19:46, 1 December 2015 (PST)
Absolutely! I thought he was already! Felicity (talk) 23:04, 1 December 2015 (PST)
I, too, was surprised when I realized he wasn't. I support, of course. --Ethan (talk) 02:16, 2 December 2015 (PST)
Hi Phil,
Congratulations and thank you! You are now an admin. Please see the fledgling Appropedia:Guidelines for administrators for more info. There should be more tools available to all the admins at Special:SpecialPages as well. --Lonny (talk) 19:56, 2 December 2015 (PST)
Thanks all --Philralph (talk) 23:53, 2 December 2015 (PST)

Feedback on support page please. (New recurring donation option.)

Please check our donate page, clicking from the left sidebar: Support -> Donate. (I'm not linking it here - too easy for someone to insert scam or phishing links in a wiki page.)

I've added a recurring donation option. The page now needs a couple of things, and I'd love suggestions:

  • A small number of engaging images from the wiki, illustrating a range of what we do - e.g. energy, water, building.
  • More engaging text, for a diversity of potential donors.

Thanks! --Chriswaterguy (talk) 14:56, 6 December 2015 (PST)

Hi Chris, some pics from CASwiki, which could be balanced by pics of other stuff e.g. energy, water, building, etc:
Philralph (talk) 09:31, 11 December 2015 (PST)
Thanks Phil.
Since I posted, I had the thought that I should use images that are public domain or that we have copyright for, so we can just have the images, without attribution links. Donation pages shouldn't have unneeded links, which are opportunities for the reader to get distracted before donating :-). Anyway, I'll look for public domain images - but we could use these images elsewhere. --Chriswaterguy (talk) 16:53, 12 December 2015 (PST)

CC-BY-SA logo links to GNU FDL license

Just thought I'd point out that the CC-BY-SA logo at the bottom right corner of each page links to the GNU FDL license instead of the CC license. --Hairless Wookie (talk) 01:00, 7 January 2016 (PST)

Woops – thanks!
Note for a tech admin: The guide to editing the footer is at mw:Manual:Footer. I guess we're still on CC Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported, but just FYI there is now CC Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (but I haven't read up on the significance of the update). --Chriswaterguy (talk) 03:45, 7 January 2016 (PST)

Tool for converting formatted text to wiki markup

For those that aren't aware, we have a tool here which is useful if you have a document or web page that you are converting to a wiki page. (Of course, be sure that you have permission, and give attribution as appropriate).

The tool: Wikedbox. --Chriswaterguy (talk) 04:32, 8 January 2016 (PST)

A few things noticed since the update

I wanted to mention a few things this non-techie editor has noticed since the site was updated:

  • I often see what I think are the announcements at the bottom of the front page, misaligned and where they shouldn’t be. I can upload a screenshot if nobody else is seeing this.
  • The blog section on the front page appears to be blank.
  • I can’t access Special Pages at all. When I go to http://www.appropedia.org/Special:SpecialPages and click on any of these pages, the response I get is this: The following data is cached and may not be up to date. A maximum of 1,000 results are available in the cache. There are no results for this report.
  • As I add categories to uncategorised articles, the total article count seems to be going backwards. I am not sure why this is happening.

I thought I’d best pass these things on. Thanks for considering them. Felicity (talk) 02:02, 12 January 2016 (PST)

Whoa – thank you for noticing those changes, and letting us know. I'm not in charge of tech things, but we do have a developer doing a few things. Let's see what Lonny says. --Chriswaterguy (talk) 05:58, 12 January 2016 (PST)
Thanks Chris, happy that it's on the radar. Felicity (talk) 00:40, 13 January 2016 (PST)
Felicity's points 1&2 are the same bug. The blog section list doesn't conform to proper formatting. I'm guessing it's a conflict of the new CSS with JS. The weird thing is sometimes if you reload it *does* format correctly. --Ethan (talk) 21:27, 21 February 2016 (PST)
This falls under "feature, not a bug": since the update any page you edit will have the watch box checked (ticked) by default. Can we turn that off? --Ethan (talk) 19:43, 25 February 2016 (PST)

Appropedia in Google's definitions boxes! Conventional farming needs work

If you search for how to measure stream flow or conventional farming on Google, the definition box now comes from Appropedia. Confirmed in multiple countries. Great stuff... except that our conventional farming isn't as good as it could be.

(Thanks to Lonny for discovering this!) --Chriswaterguy (talk) 14:47, 31 January 2016 (PST)

Nice to learn this, thanks for the update. It's great to learn about increasing traction and responsiveness, keep up the great work everyone. :) Felicity (talk) 02:37, 2 February 2016 (PST)

permaculture content ready for "prime time"?

I was going to wait until I finished porting content from PermaWiki to do this, but there was a recent heated conversation about open-source permaculture. I was a little disappointed that our broadest permaculture pages didn't get mentioned, though some other sections of Appropedia were referenced. So I went ahead and added permaculture to the main page header, the sidebar and the main page selected portals (which may need to wait for a cronjob or cache refresh to appear?). I hope to raise the profile of Appropedia as permaculture wiki, because it is the only active one out there (also the Appropedia Foundation is a more trustworthy steward of this information than Wikia). If anyone objects, we can reverse these changes. --Ethan (talk) 21:38, 27 February 2016 (PST)

Thanks Ethan, looks good.
We have a number of great content areas, so I'm wondering how best dto display it all... might be something to ask a MediaWiki-friendly web designer. --Chriswaterguy (talk) 06:16, 12 March 2016 (PST)

Support needed to keep Appropedia alive and kicking goals

I've worked out how to let people make a recurring monthly donation to the Appropedia Foundation, to keep Appropedia growing and doing awesome things. If you're in a position to support us, please click "Donate" in the sidebar. Thanks! --Chriswaterguy (talk) 18:29, 16 March 2016 (PDT)

Are Appropedia Foundation accounts available somewhere? Would it be possible to have a direct link to them from the "Donate" page? Philralph (talk) 02:20, 18 March 2016 (PDT)
No, but I'd support making them available. Maybe we need to look at equivalent organisations (e.g. the Wikimedia Foundation) to help us with out whether there are particular things we need to keep confidential. I'm neither a lawyer nor an accountant.
I'll pass this suggestion on to the board. Thanks. --Chriswaterguy (talk) 04:34, 18 March 2016 (PDT)
Donation error PayPal has told me twice:

Sorry — your last action could not be completed Error Message

Your request failed due to technical difficulties.Please try again after some time.

Just so you know. Koavf (talk) 16:20, 3 July 2016 (PDT)

Following on from my earlier comments: could Appropedia make use of open collective? - "A group of people with a shared mission that operates in full transparency"? Might this sort of thing be useful even if used to meet some, not necessarily all, of Appropedia's objectives, at first? Philralph (talk) 10:49, 19 April 2017 (PDT)

for more see eg: Open Collectives: transforming our cities from the bottom-up, Apr 11: @OuiShare and BrusselsTogether, "lets you create a virtual association so that you can get started in no time and focus on what you want to do to improve Brussels" - though there may be better examples in the context of Appropedia, Philralph (talk) 11:10, 19 April 2017 (PDT)

New related wiki

Waterpedia See https://waterpedia.wiki/wpw/index.php/Waterpedia:About I figured this community and that one can work together. Koavf (talk) 16:15, 3 July 2016 (PDT)

Ekopedia down

See here I get a 404 message:

Page not found (404) Request Method: GET Request URL: http://ekopedia.org/

Using the URLconf defined in odc.urls, Django tried these URL patterns, in this order:

   ^admin/
   ^odc/(?P<url>.*)/$ [name='odc']
   ^_odc/(?P<url>.*)/$ [name='odc']
   ^__odc/(?P<url>.*)/$ [name='odc']
   ^bloquery_post/ [name='bloquery_post']
   ^fiches/$
   ^vol/(?P<ht>.+)/$ [name='vol']
   ^vol2/$ [name='vol2']
   ^show/(?P<mo>.+)/$ [name='show']
   ^show_all/(?P<mo>.+)/$ [name='show_all']
   ^templ/(?P<mo>.+)/$ [name='templ']
   ^mod/(w{0,50}) [name='mod']
   ^web_editor/attachment/add/$ [name='docs']
   ^web/dataset/call_kwx$ [name='docs']
   ^website/
   ^theme_enark/
   ^web/
   ^web_editor/
   ^builder/
   ^theme_common/
   ^docs_list/$ [name='docs_list']
   ^docs_upload/$ [name='doc_add_form']
   ^doc_erase/(?P<name>.*)/$ [name='doc_erase']
   ^static/website/translations/$ [name='noslash']
   ^(?P<url>.*)/$ [name='url']
   ^media\/(?P<path>.*)$

The current URL, , didn't match any of these.

You're seeing this error because you have DEBUG = True in your Django settings file. Change that to False, and Django will display a standard 404 page. Does anyone know what's up? The same thing happens at en.ekopedia. Koavf (talk) 20:42, 10 July 2016 (PDT)

The Ekopedia and Appropedia teams are working together on the problem, but could use more help from people experienced in database and wiki management. --Ethan (talk) 23:06, 21 July 2016 (PDT)

Spam and Captchas

Hello Intrepid Appropedians!

Thank you for your patience with our Captchas recently. We know that they had become too arduous and buggy. We have upgraded our captcha based spam abatement significantly. We hope your experience is also significantly enhanced! Please let us know if you have any problems editing, joining, posting, etc.

Thanks again, --Lonny (talk) 15:05, 21 September 2016 (PDT)

Great job! Very minimal spam is making it through now. --Ethan (talk) 22:48, 25 February 2017 (PST)

Saying Hi

Hi just introducing myself. I have some years experience on Wikipedia, here I'm interested in studying and working on many topics related to off grid + self sufficient homesteading. If anyone wants to collaborate on such topics let me know. Peace. Moribund (talk) 10:14, 17 February 2017 (PST)

Hi Moribund,
Great to meet you. Thanks for your contributions!
--Lonny (talk) 11:24, 17 February 2017 (PST)
Welcome Moribund. Please do share your knowledge and let us know if you've any questions. Your interests are perfect for here. Felicity (talk) 15:13, 17 February 2017 (PST)
Welcome! Good contributions so far. Nice to have someone who's experienced with natural construction. --Ethan (talk) 00:24, 20 February 2017 (PST)
Hi all and thanks for welcome. Unfortunately no practical experience of natural construction, but this should change soon =)
Let me know if anyone wants to collaborate on any topics. Moribund (talk) 14:53, 22 February 2017 (PST)

Appropriateness

One area on this wiki that could really use some development is appropriateness. I don't fault Appropedia for not elaborating it clearly, since this is a wider issue in the permaculture, alternative building and possibly also the appropriate tech communities. I'm sure we can all think of instances of people becoming enamored with a certain technique or technology without giving due consideration to how well it would fit into the specific contexts. What I propose we do:

  1. Further develop the general notion of appropriateness across all sustainability disciplines. The context article is a good start.
  2. Note the in/appropriateness of specific techs in various contexts, including possible modifications. Perhaps we should add a recurring section for context considerations to specific tech articles.

--Ethan (talk) 20:01, 25 February 2017 (PST) I should add that this information/ approach permeates Appropedia. What I'd like to do it bring it to the fore. --Ethan (talk) 20:10, 25 February 2017 (PST)

Thank you Ethan. I appreciate your points and vision. I think that it is a common problem, at least for me, to forget to bring to the forefront the water in which we swim. I am excited to see your efforts in this direction!
PS Some day, I would like to build some Human Centered Design content and make the connection between empathy and appropriateness.
Thanks again, --Lonny (talk) 22:05, 25 February 2017 (PST)

Fab labs

An intriguing new model of production. Anyone encountered one of these yet?

https://www.reddit.com/r/Permaculture/comments/6eb8hy/i_want_to_introduce_you_all_to_an_emerging_idea/ —The preceding comment was added by Ethan (talkcontribs) 04:57, 1 June 2017‎

Hi Ethan, I love fab labs and have contacts with a few engaged fab lab'ers over the past decade. Definitely cool. --Lonny (talk) 12:01, 16 June 2017 (PDT)

RAIN archive

A digital archive of back issues of RAIN magazine is now available here: http://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/rain_japt/ --Ethan (talk) 22:52, 13 June 2017 (PDT)

So cool! --Lonny (talk) 12:02, 16 June 2017 (PDT)

Quote and Cite templates

I think it would be useful to have these same templates:

How to transfer:

https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Templates#Copying_from_one_wiki_to_another

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Export

In testing it took a minute or two for wikipedia to prepare the Template:Quote. It's 22.8 mb with all the history.

Facilitator (talk) 14:45, 18 September 2017 (PDT)

Hi Facilitator, My apologies on the slow reply. Is this something you are still looking into? --Lonny (talk) 11:45, 1 November 2017 (PDT)

Database Dumps are Empty

Appropedia:Current_dump hosts currentdump.xml.gz. This file is supposed to be a complete dump of the text of Appropedia, which is useful for offline browsing. For weeks (and maybe longer), the file has been just 20 bytes - an empty archive file with no content. Can somebody look into fixing this?

We would love help on this. --Lonny (talk) 12:33, 13 March 2018 (PDT)

Vandalism: image uploaded revert fails, etc.

A new version of [[File:Thames sunset.jpg]] was uploaded yesterday. Revert failed. Deleting and re-uploading also failed to revert. This file currently used on 14 pages including (often on) Welcome to Appropedia/CAnews. Have blocked User:Xerou012. Advice appreciated on how best to get back to the intended image? Philralph (talk) 03:11, 1 November 2017 (PDT)

Thank you. Sorry for the issues. The issue is that it can take more than a few minutes for a newly updated image to propagate through the system. It should be good on all of the pages now... it is for me. If it is not for you, please try doing a hard refresh of your browser. Thanks again, --Lonny (talk) 11:41, 1 November 2017 (PDT)
Thanks, Lonny, Philralph (talk) 11:46, 1 November 2017 (PDT)
Thank you Philralph! --Lonny (talk) 22:25, 1 November 2017 (PDT)

offer of "help to ignite" / invite to collaboration to A People's Food Policy (UK)

Have emailed an offer of "help to ignite" / invite to collaboration to A People's Food Policy (UK) - copy of email on http://www.appropedia.org/Talk:Food_UK Philralph (talk) 09:23, 10 January 2018 (PST)

Excellent. Thanks. --Lonny (talk) 13:40, 10 January 2018 (PST)

Why are you non-profit?

Why are you non-profit, when you can be for-profit, and use said profit to solve the problems of the world? Like, document things by making youtube videos, to also get people to watch you helping people, maybe sell merchandise like any good youtube channel does, maybe even sell toy-versions of technologies useful for appropriation, maybe even some tiny e-book of only a few dozen pages, half or more being with only images (i.e. left page text and right page image to go with the text), maybe print some books to give to developing settlements, and make sure to include links or search terms for people who have internet access, and then you can go ahead and accept volunteers to help you out, eventually for the chance of being on youtube, being seen working. The whole point would be to be quite transparent in regards with what you're helping people with, and advertise your merchandise online with lines like "every 100 plushies helps us build one treadle pump well for a settlement, and you can watch us on youtube so you can see for yourself and show others that things can change for the better, if you invest in the right groups of people.

So let's do a recap:

  • Youtube videos of you doing actual work to help people, posted on your very own Youtube channel
  • merchandise related to you doing some of that work, eventually also some e-books (PDFs) and possibly even physical books (i.e. through Amazon), and even selling the very tools and tech you're helping people with, with a plain cheap version for those in need, and a fancy version for those who can afford and want to support the cause.
  • allow volunteers to help you out, in exchange for appearing in a video on Youtube, while they work.
  • be for-profit instead of non-profit, so you can use the profit to help change the world for the better, one problem at a time.
  • possibly also build a bikecar/velocar, which is a pedal powered 3-wheeler 4-wheeler (2 wheels in the front), and the frame can just be some painted textile (shell) resting on an skeleton (out of wood or metal, or even plastic). Preferably make it so it can change gears up to easily going 50 km/h (30 mph), or even faster (to be road-safe).

Here's a logo I've made for fun. If you want to use it, I can give you the source files.


Good luck!

- Sapioit

Non-profits can make a profit; it's just that this one doesn't. Koavf (talk) 20:45, 20 September 2018 (PDT)
I understand. My point is, by being for-profit, it can become competitive enough to actually change the world fast enough to make a difference in more than just a very few remote places.
- Sapioit
Thank you both. It is true that non-profits can sell products, advertising, etc. It is also true that for the most part, Appropedia does not do those things. We also agree that it is time to change that. The book To Catch the Rain is one of our first strong attempts at having a revenue stream to accelerate the impact of Appropedia. Indeed we need a lot of IT help (e.g. with spam abatement, updates, modernization, etc.) and server support (it costs hundreds of dollars a month to run servers that can keep up with our amount of traffic). Therefore, we need to bring in money just for those things... and then to thrive! Thanks again, --Lonny (talk) 16:10, 23 September 2018 (PDT)

Ideas to increase participation in Appropedia

Hi all, not logged on here in a while although I have periodically browsed articles without logging on or editting.

I am sad to see that this wiki is not that busy (at least as far as I can see). I propose a few suggestions about how to increase participation (disclaimer, I do not know if any of these measures are already in place)

  • It took me several mins to locate this page again, I feel since this page is the main forum for the whole site (?) it should be much more prominently signposted at the top of all of the major central pages (i.e. main page, "about" page, perhaps even a header on each individual talk page?
  • I see that permies.com is listed as a collaborator. How about starting a group on that site for appropedia editors to raise awareness.
  • In a similar vein, how about forming a group on wikipedia, indeed this is where many new editors could easily be attracted.

Anyway, I am very lazy these days but I want to collaborate a lot more. Pls msg me if anyone wishes to collaborate on writing articles. My areas of interest are broadly under the scope of "homesteading" ... natural building (particularly eathbag building, passive solar design, earth sheltering), sustainable + subsistence farming (e.g. forest gardening, small scale fruit and veg production), domestic scale + sustainable + off grid energy systems, aquaponics, etc.

Over the next few weeks I wish to deveolp material on earth tubes (ground coupled heat exchange).

Best wishes, Moribund (talk) 07:39, 1 January 2019 (PST)

Hi Moribund,
Thanks for the suggestions. We are always hoping to grow the community. These few weeks around Jan 1st are always the most slow. That said, we were averaging over 100 edits a day for the last few months (and now have 388,398 edits to date!). Currently our efforts are focused on updating Appropedia's infrastructure so that it runs faster for everyone around the world. It will probably take another two months to finish the updates and migration (especially given our limited financial resources). Until then, maybe you could try forming the group on wikipedia (I am not sure how that works)?
Thanks again, great to see you, --Lonny (talk) 00:31, 2 January 2019 (PST)
I see there are threads on Permies.com already related to this wiki. On wikipedia it might be harder to create a group since they have to be very strict about having all community activity directly related to editing the encyclopedia. However one approach might be to post on talk pages for wikiprojects that might be interested in appropedia. The message would have to be carefully phrased to be relevant to the encyclpedia. For example, some content on appropedia might be useful in wikipedia articles. I also know that they do not allow for "how to manual" type content, and so appropedia pages might therefore be good to link to from encyclopedia articles. Regards, Moribund (talk) 04:54, 4 January 2019 (PST)

Article about Earth tubes on Ekopedia

I've started the Earth tubes article on appropedia. I could not see it exactly covered when searching here, the nearest was Ground source heat pumps.

Anyway, I can see there is a lot of good info on the Ekopedia article about the same topic [3]

I've used the google translate feature to try and read the article with limited success.

It would be good to merge the content with the appropedia article.

I note that Ekopedia content is being merged with appropedia? Has translation already been done somewhere? Regards, Moribund (talk) 15:11, 5 January 2019 (PST)

Sounds great! Eventually we hope to merge completely...but that is not currently happening. --Lonny (talk) 10:51, 6 January 2019 (PST)

Reporting spam

Not sure of normal procedure you have on this wiki, but I suspect these accounts represent paid editor(s) who are posting spam links. Also I would take this moment to point out large volume of new user accounts each day, and only a tiny handful are used to edit. Suspect the new accounts are being started by a bot. Is there a way to make the process of starting an account more robust? Regards, Moribund (talk) 11:36, 21 January 2019 (PST)

Hi Moribund,
Thanks for pointing those out. We recently have made the process of starting an account more robust. It helped substantially, but there is still much more to do. Our next steps are upgrading the servers and implementing some other spam prevention tools, that hopefully will not increase the difficulty of creating an account and making edits for real users.
I deleted the offending pages. You can always edit a spam page and replace it with {{delete|spam}}. Or, if you are interested, we could provide you spam deletion privileges as an admin.
Thanks again, --Lonny (talk) 14:03, 21 January 2019 (PST)
If you feel that admins are needed then ok, I will need instruction on that though. Otherwise I will pages I see as directed above.
On the topic, this user (Special:Contributions/Andromeda) is pasting the same link on many user pages. Regards, Moribund (talk) 14:34, 24 January 2019 (PST)
Thank you. I have nominated you and I will follow up soon. I also posted a request to Andromeda. Thanks for pointing that out. --Lonny (talk) 18:39, 24 January 2019 (PST)
  • Another user page + user talk page that is being used for spam, would appreciate an admin taking a look [7] + [8]. Kind regards, Moribund (talk) 06:55, 17 February 2019 (PST)
I'm pleased with the recent tuning of the spam filters. The frequency of spam has dropped considerably. Of the 10 pages I just deleted 9 of them were user pages, so that's probably the area we should focus on next. Thanks for the vigilance Moribund. --Ethan (talk) 18:41, 22 February 2019 (PST)
I get the feeling since it is exactly the same pattern of spam each now that it is the same individual / bot doing it. Moribund (talk) 12:01, 23 February 2019 (PST)
Thank you Moribund for accepting the responsibilities of being an admin! --Lonny (talk) 19:45, 11 March 2019 (PDT)

Congrats, welcome to the team! --Ethan (talk) 02:08, 12 March 2019 (PDT)

OK Thanks, I'll do my best. Moribund (talk) 11:32, 12 March 2019 (PDT)

Registration

On a related note, the page Appropedia:About states "Registration is encouraged but not required for contributors." As far as I can see this needs to be updated, it is currently necessary to have an account and ot be logged in to edit pages? Moribund (talk) 10:03, 24 February 2019 (PST)

Thank you for pointing this out. It is now fixed. --Lonny (talk) 19:45, 11 March 2019 (PDT)

Should these 2 categories be merged together?

  • Category:Gardening
  • Category:Horitulcture and gardening

I note also that Category:Agriculture contains many articles which are specifically about cultivation of plants rather than production of other types of food.

Unless anyone has any objections I was thinking of merging the 2 categories above and moving some plant specific pages from agriculture to the subcategory of Horticulture and gardening. Kind regards, Moribund (talk) 10:37, 20 March 2019 (PDT)

No objections from me. Thanks! --Lonny (talk) 16:17, 20 March 2019 (PDT)

Autoblock triggering for unrelated IPs

I have seen several instances of this happening.

  1. [9] when I accidentally edited a spam page without being logged in. Lonny deleted the page, Ethan later blocked the user. I was then prevented from editing, and it was assumed that autoblock triggered because of this. However, I noticed that the block message stated that he intended blockee was 66.33.193.178 ... and this would definately not be any IP I would have used.
  2. (event copied from log)[10] "21:05, 22 March 2019 Lonny changed block settings for Provitazol Review tab (Talk | Contributions) with an expiry time of indefinite (account creation disabled, autoblock disabled) (Abusing multiple accounts - I changed the IP to not be blocked as somehow it was also my IP??"
  3. I think the same thing happened? [11]
  4. An Appropedia user messaged me saying they had autoblocked, related to this block: [12]. The user tells me that the block message they received tells them that the indended blockee is 66.33.193.178, user also mentions that this is not their IP.
  5. Another appropedia user messaged me saying they had been blocked when they tried to edit their user page. They did not give any details so I am waiting for more info.

Note that the IP from 2 of these cases is the same (New Dream Network, LLC). I am starting to suspect the intended blockee will be the same in the other cases as well? Sommething seems to be going wrong here. I am concerned that this will discourage legitimate users from contributing. I have provisionally disabled the autoblock on all recent blocks (the blocks I did anyway), as this does not seem to stop the continued creation of user accounts that will post spam anyway. If anyone knows anything about this, please post. Kind regards, Moribund (talk) 01:43, 23 March 2019 (PDT)

Another case of the same today, msg states intended blockee 66.33.193.178. Anyone shed some light on this? It seems the autoblock feature is nonfunctional. Moribund (talk) 13:19, 16 April 2019 (PDT)
I am messaging User:Chriswaterguy and Roger about this. It seems to have started happening right after we enabled a new type of caching. --Lonny (talk) 18:15, 21 April 2019 (PDT)
OK, thanks. Moribund (talk) 23:19, 21 April 2019 (PDT)
Yep... happened again to some students for IP 66.33.193.178 which was blocked for User:Traydugout59. Hopefully we will get to the bottom of this soon. I realize the timing corresponds with the new caching and moving to https (from http).--Lonny (talk) 00:24, 22 April 2019 (PDT)
Woohoo! Roger fixed it. For prosperity - it stemmed from not adding our server's own IP to $wgSquidServers. Should be good to go from now on out. --Lonny (talk) 15:14, 22 April 2019 (PDT)
OK, I'll try it again. thanks, Moribund (talk) 10:59, 23 April 2019 (PDT)

Is this spam?

Any opinions about whether these pages all created by the same user suitable for this wiki? They all appear to be products of the company listed first. I feel they probably should all be deleted. Moribund (talk) 10:59, 29 May 2019 (PDT)

One of those is a red link. Checking only Charcoal briquette production line‎, that doesn't seem to be spam but it is poorly written and unattested. Koavf (talk) 12:25, 29 May 2019 (PDT)
I agree that they are too spammy. I went ahead and deleted them and left a message in the summary and for Amy at User_talk:Amyyan. Thank you! --Lonny (talk) 14:24, 29 May 2019 (PDT)

Links to site: "Earthava"

Hi, just wanted to raise concerns about the actions of this user: Special:Contributions/Samalmaairgy

I have not checked every single one of their contributions, however the clear pattern seems to be entirely restricted to adding of links to the blog / website "Earthava" (recently rebranded from Survival Renewable Energy") [13]

Back in 2015 I can see Lonny requested that the user make more substantial contributions than merely posting links to the site. This appears to have gone unanswered (at least in public). The user name seems to be set up by the owner of the site (Assmaa Almaairgy 'Sam') and I feel it can be said that this user is editing this wiki 100% for self promotional reasons.

While the website contains a some info of use, the nature of some of the content seems a bit too commercially motivated, e.g.:

  • An app for users to enter their address and get a free estimate of how much money they could save by having PV system installed, likely later to be contacted by an installation company. Presumably there is a financial agreement between the owner of the site and the company giving the quote.
  • "Top 10 product reviews" format pages, of which there many examples some of which linked directly from this wiki, listing price comparisons and give links to amazon to purchase products. Presumably those are affiliate links which earn revenue for the site owner. (examples [14][15]) Indeed, it is unclear if there is any financial relationship between the product manufacturers and the site owner.

I feel the user is acting in bad faith and has showed no intention of changing their behaviour for many years, and that these links should all be removed since they add little to the wiki. Thoughts? Kind regards, Moribund (talk) 13:37, 17 June 2019 (CDT)

Hi Moribund,
I agree with your general assessment.
Eventually, we need to decide if we have a spot for links like this with a small sponsorship cost (that also pays for someone to make sure the linked information is appropriate)...but that is a different and much bigger conversation (one started at Appropedia:Supporters/FAQ).
On to Samalmaairgy's contributions. Sam seems well intentioned with a quite small social media presence. I think it is reasonable to reverse the majority of her edits. I think it is reasonable for her to promote her blog on her userpage (User:Samalmaairgy). I would love if she started adding value to Appropedia as her spirit and background seem to fit well. I will reach out to her on her instagram at instagram.com/assmaa.almaairgy/ to let her know. It is very possible that she never saw my comments on her talk page and is acting in what she thinks is good faith.
Thank you for catching this and for your thoughts. --Lonny (talk)

Hello There,

I am Sam, I am glad I came across this discussion by coincidence because no one has informed me directly about this issue. I can see the concern here regarding my actions here on Appropedia. I want to reply to the first concern about my actions and that fact that they are for promotional purposes. First of all the banner at the bottom of the articles is well-known and widely used among big websites. Treehugger.com uses this banner sitewide. and I believe that there are too many links that link back to Treehugger in Appropedia with no problem. Also, I think Appropedia has no problem to link to websites that are showing ads.

Second of all, Regarding the top 10 products articles, My first concern was to add value to Appropedia pages, I make sure that the page is relevant, so if the article talks about solar garden lights I search for a relevant page that talks about solar lighting or garden lights.

Third of all, not all of my contributions are about 10 top products. I added many relevant articles in these Appropedia pages:-

https://www.appropedia.org/Solar_energy_conversion_system https://www.appropedia.org/Energy_from_the_wind

The articles I mentioned there provide relevant information with no products showing. unless back to my first point Appropedia does not allow to link to websites that are showing ad banners.

According to what you mentioned, "that because of my 'small' social media presence I try to seek promotion in somewhere else like Appropedia." Though it seems offensive, I won't focus on it much because my first intention was to add value to Appropedia then comes my benefits. I think it is not fair to reverse all of my contributions. And, for the time being, I will stop any further contributions here on Appropedia, because I wished that there were instant notices to my contributions instead if just talking about it without me even knowing if I was doing something that goes against Appropedia Rules.

Thank you! --—The preceding comment was added by Samalmaairgy (talkcontribs) 13:40, 19 June 2019‎


Hello Sam,
Thank you so much for your response. First of all, my apologies for seeming offensive. I meant that your small social media presence was a positive sign that you were like much of the Appropedia community just trying to find ways to have impact, as opposed to a giant conglomerate bent on only making money. I do not mean that those are the only options, I only meant that you seemed like a real person based on the little that I could see. I understand how it reads offensively, I should have been more clear.
I did reach out to you a few years ago, via your userpage, and email (if you had one registered), at User_talk:Samalmaairgy. I am sorry that message did not get to you. We recently updated our email services so that they are less likely to end up in spam. I also just added you on Instagram so that I could alert you to our concerns...and so we could get to know each other a little more and seek synergistic ways to support our efforts. For example, you could definitely add links and information about your sites and project at User:Samalmaairgy.
You are correct that we do not have a good and clear policy on adding link backs. That said, we strongly encourage value added content to be added to Appropedia instead of just links to the URLs belonging to the poster. Our policy usually has us removing these types of added links. Does that make sense?
In conclusion, my apologies for any offense. I am glad to have you hear, and to meet you. I know you have been working on this type of stuff for a long time! Please let me know your thoughts.
Thank you, --Lonny (talk) 17:49, 19 June 2019 (CDT)


In response, whether the first concern is adding value to the wiki, or just a method of free self promotion (and possibly also some fanancial gain) is impossible to prove either way. The real question is whether these edits have added anything of value to the wiki. I think since they add zero actual content and are just external links to a site of limited use to readers of this wiki, they merely act to divert traffic away from the wiki... viewers that might otherwise have contributed to the wiki. No such links are provided back to Appropedia from the blog. I agree that to add actual content to the wiki at the same time as linking would be preferable, and a link to the blog from a user page is fine, however if editing is restricted to adding such links with no content, this is questionable. The reason I did not delete all links is because the blog / website linked cannot be said to be purely commercial and is providing some information to the public without any paywall on some pages. Despite the obvious self promotion, I am unsure if those links should be removed. Other pages of product reviews and links to amazon cannot be said to be as useful to readers and should definately be deleted in my opinion. I see that the app to get a quote for solar PV savings seems to have gone (?). Therefore I will let others decide the best course of action here, kind regards, Moribund (talk) 15:54, 20 June 2019 (CDT)

Hello there,

Sam here,

In response to Lonny, Thank you so much for your positive response, I have followed you back on Instagram. I saw your message in my talk page just today, I wish I have read it back then to understand the Appropedia policies better. Thank you for your help and for your supporting words.

In response to Moribund, I believe I have already replied to your concern about my contributions in my first response. and regarding the ad at the bottom of the posts. Pardon me, it is silly to think that it was removed due to this discussion. It just happened to be good timing that is all. The ad was removed due to issues in the code, It is a temporary removal and it will be added again once the problem is solved.

There is something that worth mentioning, I get zero traffic and zero profit from Appropedia, there might be literally 1 or 2 visitors a month from Appropedia to my website. Nothing much that made you so bothered about my 'financial gain' because of my links in Appropedia. So again I am not benefiting from this in one way or another. And to not bother you again, I made it clear that my contributions whether in the form of providing raw information or adding external links to Appropedia pages will be stopped. and I will keep my contributions in my user page only according to Lonny's advice.

Thank you all!

I only see external links no other content. As I stated earlier, intentions are essentially irrelevant, the issues is whether the links are of value to the wiki, and if not then they should be removed imo. Moribund (talk) 02:25, 22 June 2019 (CDT)
As no-one else has expressed any new opinions on this, I'll remove any links that are too commercial. I feel a good rule of thumb for this is ELs to pages dedicated to product reviews and amazon links should be removed, whereas pages of general informative content might stay. I'll start work on this in a few days unless anyone else posts. Moribund (talk) 11:43, 7 July 2019 (CDT)

Climate change as an area in the lh menu?

With the rapid recent rise of Extinction Rebellion worldwide, I'm wondering if it might be a smart move to list Climate change (or similar) as an area in the left hand column menu. This might attract more editors to Appropedia? We could start with the Category:Climate change which has a similar number of articles to some other areas. Then if enough support collaborate to develop a portal? What do you think? Philralph (talk) 14:13, 19 October 2019 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Just seeing this now. I think it is a brilliant idea. Clearly most of our work ties directly to, and is driven by, climate change...making that more clear seems like a good call. --Lonny (talk) 20:51, 7 November 2019 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Great, done the first bit, will get round to working on drafting a Portal soon, but of course anyone can start on this if you like. Philralph (talk) 09:25, 8 November 2019 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Untitled

THius is hard to edit we dont know what to do —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Cabskie

How can I help? Koavf (talk) 02:57, 9 December 2019 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Appropedia's rules and bugs

Hello there! I am considering using Appropedia for posting information, references and links on climate change and related activism. I would be interested to have some more information on Appropedia's rules, which I cannot easily find on the About pages.

Wikipedia's rules on neutrality and notability would prevent posting some useful information there, and this is why Appropedia may be a useful complement. However, I wonder what replaces these two rules on Appropedia? My impression is that Appropedia is not yet developed enough for having formal rules, is that correct?

Moreover I have a technical question. Appropedia was "database locked" for a few days recently, with little information on when that situation started and how long it lasted. Over the last few years, how often did such situations occur? Which percentage of the time is Appropedia fully functional? Shapoklyak (talk) 08:46, 2 January 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Hi Shapoklyak, hopefully others might answer your questions more directly, but just wanted to say that "information, references and links on climate change and related activism" sounds good to me. As you can see from our Category:Climate change we have so far 80 pages or more on climate change topics, and content related to activism within the Category:Climate action. Browsing these may help give a feel of what we have here so far. Hope that is of some help, and please ask again if I can help further, Philralph (talk) 16:52, 2 January 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Some other links more directly related to your questions: Help:Contributing content, Appropedia:Policies - includes notes on 'Neutral Point of View' - more at Appropedia:Neutral point of view, Appropedia:Pillars and values, & more via Category:Appropedia guidelines, Philralph (talk) 17:09, 2 January 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Thanks a lot Philralph! I had failed to find this information, this is exactly what I was looking for. Shapoklyak (talk) 13:37, 3 January 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]
I might be able to explain. Our server seemed to be compromised for a few days, but it was solved by Roger who was coincidentally working on the upgrade of Appropedia. We expect the site to be fully functional now, but please let us know if you find anything unusual. --Emilio (talk) 18:20, 2 January 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Thank you for this explanation of the recent bug. Still I would like to know how frequently such technical problems occur. Is there a log of technical issues and notifications? Shapoklyak (talk) 13:41, 3 January 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Hi Shapoklyak,
In the last 10 years, we have had less than 10 days of locked databases. This happens due to a DDOS, hacking, or massive spam attack. We are quite proud of our uptime over the last 13 years. Does that answer your question? Thanks! --Lonny (talk) 22:35, 4 January 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Yes it does! Thanks. Shapoklyak (talk) 12:54, 5 January 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

A recent revert

I'm copying the following post from User talk:Auri, in case User:Auri, formerly 'Dove' (?) wishes to make a case in support of his/her edits Philralph (talk) 13:13, 18 January 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

"Hi User:Auri, thanks for your message regarding your edits to Inspiring quotes 2. I see you also similarly edited Wendell Berry. I have reverted these edits and will explain why: whilst some of the edits may have been helpful, the majority seemed to be destructive. This is because the original format of a quote is important in conveying what the author intended. For example a coma, which some might find unnecessary may have been deliberately included to signify a pause during a speech. Best not to over concentrate on pernickety detail, as this might seem a distraction, but to instead concentrate on positive and substantive edits. I see you created pages for Greta Thunberg and Naomi Klein. I also see that you have contributed before using the username 'Dove' (?) I'm copying this post to Appropedia:Village Pump in case you wish to make a case in support of your edits."

Thanks. --Lonny (talk) 01:31, 19 January 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Suggested for deletion

I am suggesting to delete Global Village Construction Kit. This page is a little less obvious if it should be deleted for developed. I would also love to hear from any people involved with the Global Village Construction Set. Thank, --Lonny (talk) 01:40, 19 January 2020 (UTC)Reply[reply]

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