SebastianHelm

errorem meum est, est nomen alii CFA conditoris, statim corrigo. Tibi gratias ago--Helveticus montanus 21:46, 27 Ianuarii 2010 (UTC)

De magistro

Greetings. You seem disturbed by the deletion of Magister. After 27 edits it said no more than this: "A magister is a man or woman who teaches in a school. Pupils come to him to learn." That's all. Andrew Dalby (disputatio) 20:17, 28 Ianuarii 2010 (UTC)

And though it's true, it gives a false impression of the whole sense of the word, whose primary meaning, according to Cassell's, is 'master', as in magister populi 'dictator', magister equitum 'the dictator's lieutenant', magister morum 'the censor', and magister sacrorum 'the chief priest'. Those senses, because of their historical priority, perhaps belong at the start of the definition. IacobusAmor 13:29, 29 Ianuarii 2010 (UTC)

Such a brief page wouldn't have lasted so long on most Wikipedias. But if you want to use that text as a start, you can of course do so. Please tell me if any problem remains, and let's solve it. Andrew Dalby (disputatio) 20:17, 28 Ianuarii 2010 (UTC)

That's not all. As Vicipaedia:Hierarchia paginarum says, there are many more criteria than just the length of the text. And I don't know of any other wikipedia where articles on undoubtedly desirable topics get deleted without discussion. If they're too short, the usual remedy is to expand them.

But I didn't come here to argue. I came here because I thought I could help out with the little Latin I know. That's why I went to specialis:Paginae desideratae and picked a topic which I felt to be most desideratum. Personally, I would much prefer even just a well categorized and linked stub than 52 red links, and my intention was to create just such a page. You have of course more experience here, so it's your prerogative to have the final say on that. Please, though, understand that such fundamental differences do affect my desire of participating here. SebastianHelm 21:34, 28 Ianuarii 2010 (UTC)

You are already helping out, and I really hope you'll continue. Your Latin skills enable you to contribute, right now, something much better than that page was. Let's work together a little longer before finding "fundamental differences" :) Interrupted by the following, due to edit conflict:

Well, truth be told, my skills are mostly the fruit of an inordinate amount of time I put into the little I wrote. I've never translated into Latin, and I don't have any good dictionary into Latin. I tried these[1][2][3], but they are almost useless. SebastianHelm 22:36, 28 Ianuarii 2010 (UTC)

True, those sites aren't impressive at first glance. For vocabulary many people use Words; it has faults, but I guess it's good in many ways. If you're looking for grammatical help, on the other hand, I don't know any reliable online resource. Andrew Dalby (disputatio) 13:32, 29 Ianuarii 2010 (UTC)

So, my current goal was only to start by creating a page that would be about as good as the page you deleted. I've done that for some time at zh:WP, and I got the impression that it was appreciated. It seems that quality expectations are different here.

I'm not trying to blow up the difference. It happens all the time that one editor finds it worthwhile to create an article which another wants to see deleted; that in itself is not necessarily a fundamental difference. But if one editor sees an article as most desirable (I a case where no conflict of interest, POV pushing, or anything of the sort is involved), and the other sees it as an uncontroversial candidate for deletion, then it unfortunately is a fundamental difference. SebastianHelm 22:36, 28 Ianuarii 2010 (UTC)

Don't draw firm conclusions on our expectations based on this sole case!

We used, in fact, to have a guideline "don't make stubs", but since we nearly all disobeyed it, we abandoned the guideline. We are surely less deletionist than en:wiki, for example; as to zh:wiki, I don't know and can't comment. As long as a page offers the tiniest bit more than a dictionary definition -- and especially if someone is currently working around it and likely to improve it -- we are practically certain to welcome it and keep it. Andrew Dalby (disputatio) 13:13, 29 Ianuarii 2010 (UTC)

Incidentally, if you do want to improve that page, I'll restore it and then we retain the history. I don't often delete in such a marginal case, but my thinking on this occasion was "its existence over six years has not encouraged anyone to improve it; just possibly a glaring redlink will achieve the desired result". Andrew Dalby (disputatio) 22:13, 28 Ianuarii 2010 (UTC)

Well, as I said am saying above, my Latin isn't really that good, and my motivation was primarily to kill the red links. In this case, the glaring redlink would have encouraged me to write pretty much the same that you deleted - which means that the two of us would have ended up spending a lot of time just to walk around in a circle. SebastianHelm 22:36, 28 Ianuarii 2010 (UTC)

True. As you'll see, Rafael has now transformed the page -- it deals with the term "Magister" much more accurately than before. By persuading me to restore it, you inspired this tranformation! Andrew Dalby (disputatio) 11:51, 30 Ianuarii 2010 (UTC)

Oh, that's a great outcome! It also served to revive my Latin vocabulary; "doctor" must have been a word I learned in my first year of Latin. Thank you also for the link to "Words"; I'll give it a try next time. SebastianHelm 21:46, 30 Ianuarii 2010 (UTC)