Wiktionary talk:Entry layout/archive 2011

Some linking please
I'd like to see each word in "Antonyms, Hypernyms, Hyponyms, Meronyms, Holonyms, Troponyms, Coordinate terms" internally linked. Mikael Häggström 15:08, 6 January 2011 (UTC)
 * In the headers in entries? Or in the document "Entry layout explained"? &#x200b;—msh210℠ (talk) 17:08, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

Link to References
The Entry_layout_explained section would benefit from a link to References, which explains in more detail the system for citing sources of factual information. —Morganiq 21:57, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

Foreign words and English translations
It says: ''Translations are to be given for English words only. In entries for foreign words, only the English translation is given, instead of a definition. Any translation between two foreign languages is best handled on the Wiktionaries in those languages.'' Does this mean that foreign words can't have definitions, or that English definitions can't have "translations" (synonyms)? Vaste 02:04, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
 * The former. But in practice foreign entries have definitions where no good translation exists. &#x200b;—msh210℠ (talk) 15:46, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Definitions of non-English terms are mostly the same as for English terms. The only difference is that for English terms, you can't define sleep to mean "sleep", while you can define dormir to mean "sleep". So foreign definitions are often much shorter, but they don't always have to be. —CodeCat 15:58, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

Rhymes
Rhymes are commonly added without a colon, but only have a star. The script does it so, for example. Can this be fixed up? Thanks, --The Evil IP address 20:05, 24 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I'd rather just remove the irritating colon. Mglovesfun (talk) 20:10, 24 September 2011 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I formulated that a bit misleading. I was actually asking if the colon can be removed from the instructions. --The Evil IP address 20:46, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

"Alternative Spellings" section not listed
I don't see "Alternative Spellings" listed in WT:ELE. It seems to be used frequently, e.g. in afternoon:. My guess is it should be just before "Alternative forms"? Facts707 17:19, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
 * It was deprecated in favor of Alternative forms; we only use Alternative forms. Mglovesfun (talk) 17:26, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Good to know - thanks for the update. Facts707 19:20, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Maybe someone can write a bot to fix the older entries? cheers, Facts707 19:21, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Example sentences: non-idiomatic collocations?
Goal number 2 of the example sentences section is "To provide notable collocations, particularly those that are not idiomatic." Not idiomatic? Wouldn't we want precisely those phrases that were common and natural, rather than weird ones? Leonxlin 19:23, 1 December 2011 (UTC)
 * You're absolutely right. We want common, natural example sentences. Either a joker got to ELE (unlikely, but I haven't checked the history), or, more likely, it's using idiomatic in the weird way we do here at Wiktionary, to mean "forming a phrase that means more than the sum of its parts". (See WT:CFI.) We'd want example sentences with non-idiomatic collocations (in that sense of idiomatic): for white, He lives in a white house is okay, but He lives in the White House is not. &#x200b;—msh210℠ (talk) 22:05, 1 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Perhaps other verbiage should be used, then, to avoid this sort of confusion? — lexicógrafa &#124; háblame — 22:17, 1 December 2011 (UTC)
 * I agree. Or idiomatic can stay, but with an explanation appended. &#x200b;—msh210℠ (talk) 22:32, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Don't punctuate the first sentence of the definition as if it were a complete sentence.
There is a long tradition in English-language dictionaries of treating the first sentence of a definition as an incomplete sentence, made complete by the assumption that additional words are implied, either ''The is a. . ., or  means. . .'', or whatever is appropriate. In fact, it appears that most Wiktionary entries respect and follow this tradition. However, official Wiktionary entry layout rules (Entry_layout_explained) require that this first incomplete sentence be punctuated as a complete sentence would be; that is, with an initial capital letter at the beginning of the sentence, and a full stop at the end. This is contrary to traditional English-language dictionary entries, but my main concern is that this approach continues to confuse in the common mind the concept of what a complete sentence is. This confusion is further reinforced by text editing software that automatically capitalizes the initial letter of every line of text in a document, whether that is appropriate or not.

By removing the requirement to have an initial capital letter and a final period, and instead requiring that the definition be punctuated as the incomplete sentence it is, Wiktionary would not continue to confuse the reading public with regard to what a complete sentence is, and it would come more fully in line with traditional, professionally edited English-language dictionaries. Thills123 17:10, 29 December 2011 (UTC)
 * It says "Each definition may be treated as a sentence: beginning with a capital letter and ending with a full stop" (emphasis supplied): in fact, some contributors do it that way and some do not. We haven't been able to reach any consensus on the issue, and the points you've raised have been among those discussed in the past. &#x200b;—msh210℠ (talk) 17:14, 29 December 2011 (UTC)