User talk:Roger Davies

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Re:Bits and pieces

I had a brief look through last night but wasn't able to make any edits because of the software updates. It seemed as if the content is mostly there, however I would make a few stylistic changes. I'll take a more detailed look this evening and then provide some more opinion. MasterOfHisOwnDomain (talk) 07:50, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

Thanks! Have you any thoughts on any gaps that are mising? Especially for newcomers to the project?  Roger Davies ^talk 02:44, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

Talkback

Hello, Roger Davies. You have new messages at Auntieruth55's talk page.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Auntieruth55 (talk) 15:37, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

Sound restoration

Hi! I know you're working on a MilHist guide to image editing. I've just finished a fairly comprehensive discussion of sound editing. It's at Wikipedia:Wikivoices/Episode_48. I'm thinking of following it up later with a sequel that uses an easier-to-restore file, so that I can revisit part II in a bit more detail (and with a more successful result), and possibly a part on sources of images, copyright, and Featured Sounds. I have used the CC-by license for the podcast part, if that's going to cause any problems, let me know and I'll relicense.

We do have numerous MilHist related featured sounds, including several songs, such as "The Battle Hymn of the Republic", "Le régiment de Sambre et Meuse", "Oh! How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning", "– When Johnny Comes Marching Home", and a couple Spanish Civil War songs, amongst numerous others. We also have directly historical material, such as Himmler's Posen speech, Neville Chamberlain's declaration of war, Rooseveldt's Day of Infamy speech, Truman announcing the surrender of Germany, also Japan; "Ich bin ein Berliner and "Tear down this wall" (Cold war counts, right?); Ford's Vietnam clemancy remarks, Bush's address to the nation after September 11 - You get the idea. Shoemaker's Holiday ^{Over 206 FCs served} 22:05, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

Great! Do you have time please to write a paragraph or two of introduction, perhaps summarising what the soud file contains, here? It would be greatly appreciated if you could.  Roger Davies ^talk 01:46, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

50th Battalion, CEF

Can you help me with this article? I need some help:( Message me back Please. (Mrjeremister (talk) 20:57, 21 September 2009 (UTC))

What do you need help with exactly?  Roger Davies ^talk 02:00, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

I need help with citations and a quick review would be nice too :) (Mrjeremister (talk) 20:16, 22 September 2009 (UTC))

Adding single references

These are simplicity itself to make. You merely add <ref> and </ref> before and after the text you wish to use as the reference. For example, if you wish to cite page 212 of a book by Harper, published in 1970, you type: <ref>Harper (1970), p 212.</ref>.

Using one reference several times

If you're going cite, say, "Harper (1970), p 212", two or three times, you start by creating a special type of multi-ref for it and giving it a unique name, like, "Harper212" or whatever. These multi-refs are the ones that appear as:

^ ^{a b c Harper (1970), p 212}

You start by deciding on a unique name for the multi-ref. Using author name and page number, with no spaces, is popular as it's easy to see what it refers to. If you wish to use spaces in the ref name, you need to enclose it double quotes (for example, <ref name="Harper 212">. Otherwise, you build up the multi-ref in a three-step process by typing:

1 <ref name=Harper212> (comment: this creates the name tag)

2 <ref name=Harper212> Harper (2002), p 212 (comment: this adds the ref material to appear in the sources section)

3 <ref name=Harper212> Harper (2002), p 212 </ref> (comment: this "closes" the ref).

You use the "full" version above the first time you cite the book.

To cite the same source elsewhere in the article, you create a shortened version and repeat it as necessary

4 <ref name=Harper212/> (Comment: this is just adding a "/" before the first ">".)

To create a new multi-ref, say for Harper p234, you repeat the process above, modifying the ref name and the ref material accordingly. Example: <ref name=Harper234> Harper (2002), p 234 </ref>

That's the basics. You can make these quite sophisiticated by nesting other strings within them. Does this answer it?

I'll try to give the article a quick review at the weekend.  Roger Davies ^talk 23:10, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

Thanks

Thanks for the message, Ill try to put what I know to work (finally) and help out. Im pretty good at the Eastern Front (along with the Balkans) and Italy. I also have several books for sources like the "Rise and fall of the third Reich" Anyway, see ya later!--Coldplay Expert 23:02, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

Thanks & a request!

Thanks for your service as coordinator on WPr Military History for the last six months. Great job, the Wikiproject has matured some more. Lots more needs to be done though.

Would you consider giving a para here on what you planned to do, what you could achieve, what gave you happiness, what irritated you and your suggestions for the road ahead to the new team?

AshLin (talk) 04:05, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

I'm a bit pressed for time today but here's the draft statement I was working on for the election. This pretty much covers "what gave me happiness":

I have been Milhist lead coordinator for eighteen months, and before that was an assistant coordinator for six months.

• Worked on decentralising the project's management structure by empowering the coordinators and introducing task force adoption by coordinators;
• Revamped, renamed and edited the Milhist newspaper, The Bugle;
• Set up, recruited for, and administered three large Milhist drives (T&A07, BCAD and T&A08). The key innovative element was the worklist, which I designed and developed with Kirill, which has been much copied since.
• Set up and moderated post-drive workshops, to get feedback for fine-tuning and improving subsequent drives.
• Designed the Milhist service awards for Milhist
• Overhauled Milhist's A-Class criteria to get them much closer to featured article quality so that the step betwee the classes is easier;
• Helped develop and fine-tune the B-Class criteria and overhaul the new A-class criteria;
• Wrote the B-class FAQ.and A-Class FAQ;
• Worked on developing more effective peer, B-Class and A-class reviews;
• Created the {{WPMILHIST Review alerts}} to facilitate reviewing and encouraged reviewers to review more with motivational barnstars :)
• Set up the Logistics department to ease the path to ACR and FA and recruited the copyeditors, linguists etc to get it operational;
• Introduced and designed the A-Class medal;
• Worked on creating an atmosphere where Featured and A-Class Articles flourish (194 A-Class articles today as against 69 in Jan 2008; 396 featured articles today compared with 206 in Jan 2008).

More later,  Roger Davies ^talk 08:20, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Eagerly awaited! AshLin (talk) 08:47, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

What do I plan to do?

Help out with routine stuff and probably continue refining our evolvng quality improvement processes.

What irritated me?

Very little though edit-warriors and POV-pushers are a recurrent general irritant at Milhist

Suggestions for the road ahead to the new team?

The main thought is that Milhist's greatest strength is that it spans the globe and four thousand years of history.

I hope this helps,  Roger Davies ^talk 01:16, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

On the subject of elections, I'll assume you'll go through tomorrow and do your usual cadre of supports. Juliancolton is one vote away from joining the coordinator team, and I'd really hate to see him get so close and yet miss it. Cam ^(Chat) 05:26, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

Operation Majestic Titan and India

Hi Roger, Since Operation Majestic Titan is on, I was wondering if it is possible to get some article on the Battleships built in India before the British Raj. I believe that if you know someone with a good source on Kanhoji Angre vs EAst India company or Saamoothiri vs Portuguese article can be written. --Vinay84 (talk) 16:40, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

The scope of the operation is quite clearly laid out as including only battleships from the pre-dreadnought, dreadnought, battlecruiser, and fast battleship classifications. I believe the ships Vinay is referring to far pre-date the oldest vessels under the scope of OMT. -MBK₀₀₄ 19:12, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Personal info removal

Hi, could I ask you to hide the personal info posted at User:Drew Underwood? Thanks- A little insignificant ^{Talk to me!} _{(I have candy!)} 20:33, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

Happily, this has been dealt with, I see. It is best to refer requests of this nature direct to the oversighters by email for urgent response (Oversight-l-at-lists.wikimedia.org). It is staffed 24/7 Thanks for the message.  Roger Davies ^talk 01:00, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

Assesment

Thanks for an assesment of Klis Fortress. I have inserted a request at Wikipedia:WikiProject Guild of Copy Editors for copyedit, and will request a Milhist peer review. --Kebeta (talk) 12:35, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

DYK quick fix

Could you delete the extra "the" in the Einar Sissener hook (the 4th) on T:DYK? From WP:ERRORS. Shubinator (talk) 05:48, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Already one, I see :)  Roger Davies ^talk 05:52, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, Art got there a few minutes faster. Thanks though. Shubinator (talk) 05:53, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

MILHIST Welcome

Thanks for the MILHIST welcome, I have been active in the U.S. Military History Task Force for sometime now, and thought it was about time I add myself to the main page. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 11:57, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Good! We've talked about a TF welcome template, and sometimes update the main members' list from the TF list, but have never got round to automating it.  Roger Davies ^talk 12:06, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

While I have your ear, can I please get a third opinion on the Eight Nation Alliance talk page? --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 12:18, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Hmmm. It probably doesn't represent a global view of events. It is of course true that, in the late 19th/early 20th centuries, Western nations were engaged in imperialist adventures, with a view to grabbing influence, land, and trade, but it doesn't mean that this has to be threaded through the article. A paragraph or two of dispassionate background or context would do the job better. Perhaps more to the point, the article does need reliable sources to back up each of its claims and for each of the quotes scattered liberally in the text. Without going into it in detail that's my initial reaction anyway, speaking as a regular human being rather than as an arbitrator :)  Roger Davies ^talk 13:01, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Re:MIlhist Academy/Drive

I've been busy with school since September, but this weekend, I have no homework, so it's back to work on them! :D --Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 18:05, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Thanks very much :)  Roger Davies ^talk 07:06, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

MILHIST Academy Drive

Roger, I'm guessing this might be a bit too narrow of a focus, but as I've been writing airborne warfare-related articles over the years, there have been a few things I've come up with to help me; sources to use or, more importantly, to avoid; the best and worst websites, probably ways of writing the articles themselves. User:Ranger Steve might know a few tips as well. Would an essay on 'How to write Airborne Warfare-related content' be possible, do you think? Skinny87 (talk) 21:42, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Why not? It's a bit specialist but it is certainly worthwhile to document your experience and help others to avoid pitfalls.  Roger Davies ^talk 07:10, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Congrats!

Coordinator Emeritus of the Military history WikiProject

We give the title Coordinator Emeritus to thee, Roger Davies, in the name of the Military history WikiProject. Having received this title from the project by ratification vote we hereby present you with these stars, and wish you a long and prosperous time in your new position. For the Military history Project, TomStar81 (Talk) 00:13, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

		The WikiProject Barnstar
		In gratitude for your coordination services to the Military history WikiProject, from March 2009 to September 2009, please accept this barnstar. --TomStar81 (Talk) 02:26, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

Thank you very much, Tom. Good luck in the new role!  Roger Davies ^talk 04:19, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

WP:MHL#ADMIN

FYI, I've gone through the members list and notified every admin, and also cross-posted to the main project talk page. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 19:55, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

Thank you very much indeed :)  Roger Davies ^talk 07:11, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Re: Chevrons

Wow, thats awfully good of you Mr. Davies, many thanks! I hope I can maintain the same level of fineness and diligence in future. Cheers, Jonathan Oldenbuck (talk) 13:49, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Congratulations!

		The WikiChevrons with Oak Leaves
		By order of the cooordinators of the Military history Project, you are hereby awarded the WikiChevrons with Oak Leaves in recognition of your outstanding leadership of the Military history WikiProject, including your introduction of the logistics department, your dedication to the Tag and Assess 2008 & B-class Assessment Drive efforts, and your astute advice and never-ending support and encouragement as both a coordinator and lead coordinator. For the coordinators, TomStar81 (Talk) 18:15, 28 September 2009 (UTC)