Wiktionary:Votes/2012-01/Renaming requests for verification

Renaming requests for verification

 * Voting on: Renaming "Wiktionary:Requests for verification" to "Wiktionary:Requests for attestation", while keeping a redirect after the renaming.
 * Rationale: The name "Requests for verification" is misleading. It is not verification in general that is being requested on that page: neither verification of etymologies nor verification of pronunciation is requested there. What is being requested on the page is "attestation" as defined in WT:CFI.
 * Vote starts: 00:01, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Vote ends: 23.59, 27 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Vote created: Dan Polansky 13:49, 22 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Discussion:
 * [[Image:Wikt rei-artur3.svg|20px]] Requests_for_moves,_mergers_and_splits, March 2011
 * [[Image:Wikt rei-artur3.svg|20px]] Wiktionary talk:Votes/2012-01/Renaming requests for verification
 * [[Image:Wikt rei-artur3.svg|20px]] Beer_parlour, January 2012

Support

 * 1) [[Image:Symbol support vote.svg|20px]] Support Dan Polansky 07:09, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * 2) [[Image:Symbol support vote.svg|20px]] Support --Daniel 10:14, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * 3) [[Image:Symbol support vote.svg|20px]] Support —CodeCat 12:28, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
 * 4) [[Image:Symbol support vote.svg|20px]] Support  Ease of understanding is great, only if it doesn't also ease misunderstanding. —Michael Z. 2012-01-30 22:02 z 
 * 5) [[Image:Symbol support vote.svg|20px]] Support I think I may have been the first person to suggest this. Just sayin'. Mglovesfun (talk) 23:00, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
 * 6) [[Image:Symbol support vote.svg|20px]] Support Metaknowledge 02:41, 6 February 2012 (UTC)
 * 7) [[Image:Symbol support vote.svg|20px]] Support -- Cirt (talk) 04:03, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
 * 8) [[Image:Symbol support vote.svg|20px]] Support. There are other ways that a word might be "verified" other than attestation (for example, one might "verify" that podiumward is a "word" having meaning by pointing to the meaning of podium and the common understanding of -ward as a suffix), but the method of verification we require is attestation. bd2412 T 20:59, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Sure, and there are other ways a word might be "attested" other than by providing citations (for example, I might "attest" that I heard someone use it the other day), but the method of attestation that we require is providing citation evidence. < class="latinx" >Ƿidsiþ 12:08, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Nevertheless, "attestation" is more precise than "verification". bd2412 T 20:09, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
 * And it's so precise that it's inappropriate for the proposed rename. --EncycloPetey 05:52, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Oppose

 * 1) [[Image:Symbol oppose vote.svg|20px]] Oppose This petty change serves only to make Wiktionary's processes more obscure to ordinary users. DCDuring TALK  16:20, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
 * To quote User:Mzajac above "Ease of understanding is great, only if it doesn't also ease misunderstanding." What's your reply to that? Mglovesfun (talk) 16:24, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I give all slogans the respect they deserve. DCDuring TALK 16:27, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
 * How does that reply to Mzajac's statement? Mglovesfun (talk) 16:28, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
 * 1) [[Image:Symbol oppose vote.svg|20px]] Oppose   I still prefer Please read the prologue of this page to see what it's all about. -- Liliana • 04:05, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
 * What about a serious justification of your opposing vote? --Dan Polansky 07:55, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I second Dan's question. --Daniel 19:19, 21 February 2012 (UTC)
 * 1) [[Image:Symbol oppose vote.svg|20px]] Oppose  —Stephen (Talk) 01:01, 16 February 2012 (UTC) Sometimes it’s not just about attestation. I think I recall when someone put some Navajo words there for verification because he was concerned about missing initial glottal stops. The solution was not attestation (attestation can be problematic for many minority or endangered languages), but explanation. I don’t remember anyone ever having a problem understanding verification in the name of the page. —Stephen (Talk) 01:01, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Missing glottal stops would be for Tea room or Request for cleanup; RFV is for requests for deletion unless attested. If someone was putting them to RFV, he was confused about the scope of the page, and this is one more reason to rename the page. I have seen people confused about what the page is about, including myself. --Dan Polansky 06:41, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
 * The poster did not post the terms to discuss linguistic niceties, he believed they were misspelled and he placed them on the verification page with an aim to having them deleted. It was only in retrospect that it turned out to have been a matter for linguistics. Hindsight, as they say, is 20/20. —Stephen (Talk) 10:04, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
 * If the terms were not misspelled, they should have been attested to meet WT:CFI. If it was obvious that the terms were attested, the nomination should have been closed even without there being citations in the entry. If the terms were unattestable because Navajo itself is poorly attested, then CFI needs to be changed to better suit Navajo. Whatever the case, per CFI, WT:CFI is a standard to be met by all entries in all languages. Maybe I am missing something obvious to you; I can perhaps understand better if you provide links to these Navajo terms and the RFV discussions. --Dan Polansky 12:05, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I already stated that attestation can be problematic for many minority or endangered languages, and it is difficult to find Navajo texts on the Internet. The only good attestation in this case is the word and advice of Navajo linguists and scholars, and that is largely hearsay. I can see that this is going to be another gigantic pointless discussion with you gainsaying everything I write and endlessly repeating yourself. My original statement should have been satisfactory and not required your input, but you have not understood it and haven’t understood my replies. It’s a waste of time to discuss this with you. I oppose it, you can vote any way you like. I know that you always have to have the final word, so I am not going to answer any more of your comments here. —Stephen (Talk) 12:27, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
 * @Stephen your reason for opposing is the same as my reason for supporting. Mglovesfun (talk) 12:35, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
 * 1) [[Image:Symbol oppose vote.svg|20px]] Oppose  EncycloPetey 21:21, 22 February 2012 (UTC) WT:RFA points to the administrator page, because "RFA" on Wikipedia is a request for adminship, and we had problems with people getting lost.  Now, I don't advocate doing things simply because of the way Wikipedia does them, but I really don't think we need to introduce that kind of confusion when the existing name has served just fine for many years.  In any case, every entry should meet attestation, so a request to verify that it can be attested makes more sense to me.  Attestation can be handled both at RFV and RFD, just in different ways. --EncycloPetey 21:21, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't see how "attestation can be handled both at RFV and RFD, just in different ways". Attestation is always handled in RFV and never in RFD, from what I have seen, and in any case, attestation is never requested via RFD. Or if I am wrong, then I do not know what you are referring to, that is, how attestation can be handled or requested in RFD. --Dan Polansky 21:46, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm sure you don't see it; that's why you're supporting the vote but I'm not. If you think that attestation is never handled in RfD, then you need to go back and look at some of the entries that were saved there by attestation.  It happens there, even if you haven't seen it.  By the way, you don't have to comment on every vote that you disagree with.  --EncycloPetey 05:51, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
 * 1) [[Image:Symbol oppose vote.svg|20px]] I weakly oppose this. Actually, I have mostly the same sentiments as Ruakh, but feel just strongly enough to oppose. (Frustrating, I know...) - -sche (discuss) 07:21, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Abstain

 * 1) [[Image:Symbol abstain vote.svg|20px]] Abstain  The page isn't for requesting "attestation" (what would that even mean? "Can anyone attest to this?"); but it's not really for requesting "verification", either, except in the convoluted sense that it's for requesting verification that a term meets our so-called "attestation" criteria. I think "Requests for attestation" is a small improvement over "Requests for verification", but not enough of one for me to support. (Actually, it might even be a step backward — I think we should move away from misusing the words "attested" and "attestation" in WT:CFI as well — but again, not enough of one for me to oppose.) —Ruakh TALK 22:59, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Re: "Can anyone attest to this?": Some dictionaries seem to have a requisite sense for "attest", like sense 4 in Collins:attestation and sense 3 in Merriam-Webster:attest. In these senses, evidence or proof attests something (transitively without preposition to) rather than a person attesting to something. This matches the use of the word "attest" by which quotations attest the existence of a term. Just an academic remark. --Dan Polansky 00:13, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Maybe 'Requests for citations'? —CodeCat 00:27, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
 * @CodeCat: That's a good idea, but we have a Category:Requests for quotation for the case when we're explicitly not challenging a sense, and I think "citations" vs. "quotation" is too narrow a distinction to hang this on. Actually, come to think of it, maybe the problem is less with "verification" than with "requests". This isn't a page for requesting that people cite an entry, it's a page for requesting that an entry be deleted for lack of cites (with a grace period to allow that lack to be remedied). A better name might be Disputes of attestation or Challenges of citeability or Requests for deletion/Attestation or something. Or maybe Is this term really used?. ;-)  —Ruakh TALK 16:42, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Is there actually a difference between RFV and RFD? In RFV we assume that citations may be found, and ask for them. In RFD, we assume they won't be found or that the entry doesn't meet CFI in some other way. In both cases, we're verifying the entry against our CFI, so I'm not sure there really needs to be such a clear distinction. RFV and RFD certainly seem to be a subset of a more general kind of check. —CodeCat 13:13, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
 * @Dan Polansky: Thanks, but I don't think that's what we mean by "attestation", either. —Ruakh TALK 16:42, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
 * What we literally mean is Requests for three quotations. We say that a term is “first attested (adj., =“supported, certified, proved”) in a 1902 book.” Isn't it correct to describe that as an attestation (=“evidence, proof”) of the term? The request is to provide three such proofs, so I think Requests for attestation is correct. In any case, we specifically define “attestation,” not “verification,” for our purposes at CFI.
 * Requests for citation, Requests for citations, Requests for citing, Requests for cites, Requests to cite, would be acceptable too. —Michael Z. 2012-02-01 23:26 z 
 * None of these alternative names seems inherently more accurate than Requests for attestation, because the whole attestation system is more complex than just finding citations. One example of uncomfortably long but absurdly accurate (but not 100% accurate) name would be Requests for citations from permanently recorded media, conveying meaning, in at least three independent instances spanning at least a year. --Daniel 02:59, 6 February 2012 (UTC)
 * How about Requests for CFI check? -- Liliana • 02:18, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Requests for CFI check and Requests for attestation seem to be equally accurate, since CFI dictates our attestation rules.
 * However, I still prefer the name proposed by Dan Polansky in this voting, because attestation sounds more natural, less technical, less scary. --Daniel 19:16, 21 February 2012 (UTC)
 * "Wiktionary:Requests for CFI check" does not do; CFI is referred to both in RFV and RFD. The two main requirements from CFI--attestation and idiomaticity--are dispatched to RFV and RFD, respectively. Put differently, RFV is not for any and all checks relating to CFI but only for checks relating to attestation. --Dan Polansky 08:23, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Oh, Dan Polansky is right. --Daniel 08:46, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
 * When we're at academic corrections: "Wiktionary:Requests for citations from permanently recorded media, conveying meaning, in at least three independent instances spanning at least a year" is not accurate at all, as it only refers to one bullet point out of four bullet points from "attestation" section. Neither does "Wiktionary:Requests for three quotations" work, as the fourth bullet point from WT:ATTEST requires only one attesting quotation. Repeating the whole text of "attestation" section in the title of the page is pointless, especially when the whole text of "attestation" section is naturally referred to by the title given to the section: "attestation". --Dan Polansky 09:05, 22 February 2012 (UTC)
 * 1) [[Image:Symbol abstain vote.svg|20px]] Abstain Equinox ◑ 22:09, 6 February 2012 (UTC) Doesn't seem like a big deal, but I wouldn't object either. Equinox ◑ 22:09, 6 February 2012 (UTC)
 * 2) [[Image:Symbol abstain vote.svg|20px]] Abstain < class="latinx" >Ƿidsiþ 21:05, 15 February 2012 (UTC) per Equinox. < class="latinx" >Ƿidsiþ 21:05, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Decision
failed 8-5-3 -- Liliana • 13:57, 1 March 2012 (UTC)
 * That is what we call no consensus, with 61% support, =8 / (8 + 5). (sarcasm) Let the minorities reign supreme, lest they be "oppressed" by the "tyrrany of majority". (end of sarcasm) --Dan Polansky (talk) 14:02, 1 March 2012 (UTC)