Talk:Main Page

Extending ProofWiki to "derivations" and visual explanations?
I'm proposing the extension of ProofWiki to "derivations" and visual explanations of mathematical concepts and expressions. Examples would include the convolution integral or e.g. the Hilbert transform.

An example explanation is how the convolution integral is presented here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convolution#Visual_explanation

What do you think?


 * No reason why not. We already have plenty of visual enhancements of proofs. The only thing limiting us has been the ingenuity of the people putting such visuals in place.


 * If you have particular skills and interests in this area, then please feel free to contribute. Your work will be very welcome. --prime mover (talk) 07:47, 24 December 2015 (UTC)


 * I'm willing to contribute, but I don't understand how to edit the Wiki (if I even have the rights to set up those pages). --Mviljamaa (talk) 09:18, 24 December 2015 (UTC)


 * You should have sufficient rights to edit pages. You also have all sorts of Help and FAQ pages to read. Feel free to study these. You have links on your home Talk page, and you also have various links down the left hand side to explore. --prime mover (talk) 13:56, 24 December 2015 (UTC)

Joke namespace
Since it is of course of the utmost and pressing importance that we ensure that we have documented all the mathematical jokes in the world, we are going to need a namespace for them.

Can we therefore have a "Joke" namespace, the same way we have a "Mathematician" and "Book" namespace?

What does anyone else think? --prime mover (talk) 08:29, 3 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Meh. Use subpages until it becomes too unwieldy. It's better that they're all in one place, to be read in a single run. &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 22:02, 3 January 2016 (UTC)

Style problem
Something gone wrong with this page Category:Definitions/Fundamental Dimensions

Anyone able to sort it out? --prime mover (talk) 18:42, 23 January 2016 (UTC)


 * no worries, flushed my browser cache, all OK --prime mover (talk) 19:02, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Problem with MathJax?
Is anyone else seeing this problem?


 * [[File:MathJaxProblem.png]]

All the $\LaTeX$ strings are appearing with a following vertical line.

I first noticed this yesterday on a different machine from my usual one (Windows 7 vintage), but now I notice it on this (my trusty old Vista). On both machines I am using Google Chrome.

I just tried it on Firefux and it's fine (I don't fancy getting IE out this morning to check that too) -- so it appears it may be a problem with Google Chrome. --prime mover (talk) 07:28, 30 January 2016 (UTC)


 * I can't reproduce it. &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 09:14, 30 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Very odd. As I say, it exhibits this problem on both of the machines I have access to: work and home, and on Google Chrome only. I can't get IE to connect to it (but then I can't get IE to connect to anything, I never use it). --prime mover (talk) 10:12, 30 January 2016 (UTC)


 * This has been happing to me for the past few months on the Canary version of Chrome. I assumed it was a bug that would be fixed. I guess it has made its way into the stable branch. --Joe (talk) 16:56, 30 January 2016 (UTC)
 * According to Stack Overflow this has been fixed in MathJax. --Joe (talk) 16:58, 30 January 2016 (UTC)
 * Updated MathJax, should be fixed now. --Joe (talk) 16:59, 30 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Yep, after a page refresh, this is now looking okay. Although I may stick with Firefox, the version I currently have (and have been using all day) seems to run more easily than Google Chrome ... the only thing I don't like about it is the tab management paradigm. --prime mover (talk) 20:28, 30 January 2016 (UTC)

Template:BookReference
Some recent pages brought the need to support more authors in the BookReference template. I've expanded it to 6, and also included a whitespaced sample of the (for display reasons necessarily) cluttered wiki code producing it. This should help in making such templates more maintenance friendly. &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 14:52, 21 March 2016 (UTC)
 * I think something might have gone wrong with it -- check out the Book:Books page. Also, Template:Book needs a similar expansion.  I'd work on it myself but I lack the patience tonight :-) --prime mover (talk) 20:49, 21 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Done. (And this time, I did check that it works on existing stuff ;).) &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 11:45, 25 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Nice one. Might not have been good in all browsers, though -- I found you have to use  instead of a space at the start of any string after a pipe delimiter that is being used as an "else", otherwise the space is not interpreted. --prime mover (talk) 12:30, 25 March 2016 (UTC)

Invitation for suggestions on improvements to presentation of oscillatory systems
There's a lot of new material that's been added in the Mechanics section, all of which is working towards a treatment of (so far as I've reached) resonance. The overall plan is that the general second order ODEs defining the underlying mathematics be established separately from the applications (whether they be moving carts attached to walls by springs or L-R-C circuits, or whatever) and hence to decouple the mathematics from the physics.

I'd welcome suggestions as to how to assemble the various categories, and also how to structure the pages and even to name the pages if they appear to be inadequate. Also, any definitions which appear loose or inaccurate (and there are plenty) I definitely want to improve.

I may well be changing direction after this, as I'm getting tired. --prime mover (talk) 13:01, 27 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Good work. Personally I find physical applications of ODEs boring, so I'll refrain from having an opinion on that front. As to the particular ODEs, I would probably go with the following scheme:
 * ODE LHS (basically TeX without backslashes and braces)
 * /Homogeneous
 * /Inhomogeneous
 * /Instance
 * Furthermore I think there is a need for clear overview pages of the calibre Trigonometric Identities (e.g. Linear Second-Order ODEs). As much as possible, these should have TeX'ed click-throughs. Naming convention close to TeX will help searchability.
 * If all becomes too much to maintain, we will eventually end up introducing the Example namespace we've kept out thus far. For now, however, subpages will be fine. (We might even consider sub-wikis or other cross-wiki collaborations, but this is at present unrealistic.) &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 18:00, 28 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Overview pages was something I started, but they got a little unwieldy and I reckoned it would be easier to go back to them, but I never did.


 * Another thought I had was to subcategorise the 2nd order ones further into the three categories: over-, critically and underdamped, and then resonant, but at the "pure" level rather than at the application level, but that came to me late as I got into the thread with the oscillating cart. And there is a lot in there which need to be pulled back into the abstract, but that also needs work which I'm not prepared to do at the moment, I'm going to need to let it rest a little before I can see it from a fresh angle.


 * All contributions welcome here. I've not seen an example before of such a structured categorised approach to arranging DE's into categories before, so as to exactly what it is we're trying to achieve, I confess I'm not sure where it's going. --prime mover (talk) 19:28, 28 March 2016 (UTC)


 * I think one reason why there is no good categorisation for ODEs is because unlike e.g. finite simple groups there is provable failure in classification: we cannot solve them all in "elementary" form. This also makes me less eager to attempt such a thing.
 * But then, admittedly I have been out of the theory of DEs and everything that goes with them for a long time, so maybe I'm not in a position to comment on this. &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 19:13, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

Template:explain spans too many lines. It makes bad reading experience.
Example to illustrate that template:explain is bad.

Two solutions:

1. Use template:clarify.

2. Remove redundant sentences in template:explain.

Golopot (talk) 03:28, 7 April 2016 (UTC)


 * I disagree. --prime mover (talk) 05:43, 7 April 2016 (UTC)


 * I like the template as it is, but that page is a an eye sore. What I'd prefer to see is the explain template used once there and either it lists all the problems in one section like a summary, or to have the explain not mention any specifics and have a smaller cleaner template like clarify to each specific. Whatever the case, those template shouldn't exist on the page, so this really is a nit pick. --Ybab321 (talk) 11:27, 7 April 2016 (UTC)


 * My take on this is that "explain" templates should not be there in the first place. They are supposed to make the page ugly, so as to inspire people who know what they are talking about to put in whatever fixes are necessary so as to allow that invocation of that template to be removed. --prime mover (talk) 12:19, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

First of all, thanks for the feedback. This helps to improve the site. (NB. Naturally you are encouraged to make changes yourself -- it's a wiki after all.) However I feel a third option didn't receive sufficient attention:

3. Resolve the calls to explain by improving the article.

That's what really ought to be done. I agree that the page is ugly and tough to read now, but the solution lies not with prettifying the maintenance template(s). That being said, I think Template:Explain could say everything in need of being said on three lines. I'll see what I can do about both. &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 14:33, 7 April 2016 (UTC)


 * Here goes: Fundamental Theorem of Algebra. &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 15:09, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Problem loading WebFonts
After I have freshly booted up my (elderly Vista) machine (running Google Chrome), when I open certain pages I get a message in the bottom left corner of the screen saying: "Loading web-font TeX/Math/Italic" and the page just sits there, taking some time to finish. Then it puts the message up (same place): "Web-Fonts not available - using image fonts instead".

Take for example Area under Arc of Cycloid.

Examining the generated html, it looks, for example, something like this: 

Take as a contrast, for example, an element of a page Brachistochrone is Cycloid which does not show this error message: sin α

... which shows the Math-italic font being used as per normal.

The appearance of the mathematical text is different as well -- the one using images is heavier and slightly fuzzy.

Has anyone else noticed this, or does it look as though it is a problem with my machine? --prime mover (talk) 06:09, 13 April 2016 (UTC)


 * ... but now get this.


 * I have just made a no-change edit ("Edit" then "Save page") on the troublesome page Area under Arc of Cycloid in question, and now it is behaving correctly.


 * But now it has suddenly started doing it on Brachistochrone is Cycloid.


 * Ugh. And now Brachistochrone is Cycloid is working fine again. WTF? --prime mover (talk) 06:15, 13 April 2016 (UTC)

Prioritising stub and refactor-requiring pages
There are 993 pages that are marked as stubs, there are 853 pages that are marked as currently being refactored (refactor required or does this mean that someone is on the job?). This number is huge. Also Definition:Thermodynamics (for example) isn't marked as a stub, but looks like a stub. Surely there's more that can be said about thermodynamics!


 * Just a quick point: is intended to be more of a dictionary than an encyclopedia, hence its intention is to contain definitions rather than expositions (with the possible exception of the "Mathematician" namespace, where I confess to getting carried away sometimes). There is ample room for discursion on e.g. Wikipedia, with whom we are not and never will be in competition.  Our intention is to state the facts of a definition and that is all.


 * Hence although it "looks like a stub", to the extent that it fulfils its purpose: it defines what thermodynamics is. Such pages (those that define a branch of mathematics or other science) are not intended to be large. --prime mover (talk) 06:31, 22 April 2016 (UTC)

Anyway! I (the newest of the current newbies) would like to propose a grading system for stubs and a change to the refactoring system, and have a grade for each which denotes "low hanging fruit" to make it easier for newcomers to get started and learn. I'd rather (for example) have a proof for "equivalence relations partition a set" rejected on style grounds than pour time and effort into a longer, much more involved proof and have that declined.


 * Pages don't get "approved" or "declined" -- if their style does not come up to scratch they get a "tidy" template appended to them and then get brought up to style by one of the admins (er, yeah, that's me) who (irony alert) delights in such work.


 * So it should be no big deal. Paste up what you see fit; once it's in (if it's not a repeat of something already there, or is wildly incorrect) it stays -- and the only changes are those of, for example, stylistic improvement, correction of grammar/spelling or expansion of the argument, or rewording for clarity and/or linguistic consistency. --prime mover (talk) 06:42, 22 April 2016 (UTC)

Lastly (to keep this short) grades can convey urgency, for example Carathéodory's Theorem (Measure Theory) is extremely important in Measure Theory where as Book:Christopher Clapham/The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Mathematics, lets be honest, it isn't that urgent. Alec (talk) 19:51, 21 April 2016 (UTC)


 * Actually, I quite like that idea (particularly for stubs, anyway). I can see room for the Stub template to be expanded to take a new optional parameter "importance", or however the parameter may be named (let's be jocular and call it "defcon") to take a value of e.g. 1 to 5, where 1 is "goodness, this needs to be fixed urgently, it's embarrassing" and where 5 is "meh", and thence to automatically assign such pages into an appropriately-configured subcategory of the unwieldy and overflowing "stubs" category.


 * This is an area of development where "he who smelt it dealt it", so I'd be happy enough for you to take that on, if you so desire.


 * I am not so concerned about the "refactor" category, and (as I say to all new contributors) I would prefer to have this category left well alone except to old hands. --prime mover (talk) 06:38, 22 April 2016 (UTC)


 * These lakes of stubs/refactor pages/etc. are one of the biggest pain points this site has to deal with. Any ideas to break these categories into manageable chunks are most welcome.


 * One of the templates that might be (and at times, has been) used for this purpose is Template:Finish which signifies that while the mathematical content isn't too exciting, it's still some work to complete the page.


 * As to grading I'm not convinced yet it would work because of the inherent subjectivity involved. But there might be a case for something in between Template:Stub and Wanted proofs list.


 * Do you have concrete suggestions on how to introduce such sifting? &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 22:31, 21 April 2016 (UTC)


 * Just so as to get a handle on the quantity of work here, I have cleared 6 refactor flags over the last couple of days. It took all day to restructure the Definition:Polygonal Number refactor flag. The work is ongoing, and it gets picked up as and when the thread of what I am studying passes through one such.


 * As for the stubs, they are always available for someone coming into to see whether they want to try their hand. --prime mover (talk) 20:33, 27 April 2016 (UTC)

This old rubbish again
It has been once more pointed out that it is extremely bad form to name one's results after oneself. I understand that it displays an arrogance and egotism that have no place in the field of mathematics.

Once more there have been calls to take this result down again, on the grounds that it makes look bad.

While I completely take on board the philosophy behind this (there should be zero tolerance for self-aggrandisement in mathematics), for various reasons I am reluctant. So I will hold off purging it from the database if I get enough (? five or ten) well-argued posts to the contrary.


 * Just leave it there. It's not hurting anyone. &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 16:06, 26 April 2016 (UTC)

Original research
Can I add topics from my original research book? (note, that it is currently published only on the Web, not peer reviewed) --VictorPorton (talk) 07:25, 3 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Yeah sure. Bear in mind they will get editied a lot to fit them into house style. Be welcome. --prime mover (talk) 07:37, 3 July 2016 (UTC)


 * But what if my proof refers to a theorem present only in my book? --VictorPorton (talk) 08:02, 3 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Then you will need to add to that theorem which is present only in your book, at which point it becomes public domain under the CC-by-SA 3.0 licence and the GNU Free Documentation Licence. See Copyrights. --prime mover (talk) 09:09, 3 July 2016 (UTC)

can't do it any more
I'm staring at it and staring at it but I can't motivate myself to get any work done. It's all I can do to just post up links. Can someone take over because I'm tired. --prime mover (talk) 15:56, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Hm, sad to hear that, although I've been in similar situations in the past. Just take some time off and give yourself a rest. You've earned it. &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 21:48, 7 July 2016 (UTC)

sorry i completely lost the plot
I went and changed all those results on $a^x$ from discussing them as exponentials to referring to them as powers. Now i realise this was all wrong. Sorry, i've broken everything. Someone is going to have to mend it. Not going to be me because I don't want to, it's too much like hard work. --prime mover (talk) 12:32, 7 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I felt a little too timid to mention. I'll fix up, once I've brought up my existing pages in the category to house style :) --Keith.U (talk) 14:25, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

New wave of spammers
In order to penetrate our spam blocker, prospective spammers need to send us a CV.

Here are a couple of recent CVs which have proven to be bogus:


 * Hey, I am Neal Wrangler , working with Synopsis LLC as a Senior Project Consultant

and:
 * Neal is Director, Software Architect, and Meme Wrangler at ThoughtWorks, a global IT consultancy with an exclusive focus on end-to-end software development and delivery. Before joining ThoughtWorks, Neal was the Chief Technology Officer at The DSW Group, Ltd., a nationally recognized training and development firm.


 * Neal has a degree in Computer Science from Georgia State University specializing in languages and compilers and a minor in mathematics specializing in statistical analysis. He is also the designer and developer of applications, instructional materials, magazine articles, and video presentations. He is also the author of 6 books, including the most recent Presentation Patterns and Functional Thinking. Given his degree, Neal is a bit of a language geek, with affections including but not limited to Ruby, Clojure, Java, Groovy, JavaScript, Scala and C#/.NET. His primary consulting focus is the design and construction of large-scale enterprise applications. Neal is an internationally acclaimed speaker, having spoken at over 300 developer conferences worldwide, delivering more than 2000 presentations. If you have an insatiable curiosity about Neal, visit his web site at nealford.com. He welcomes feedback and can be reached at nford@thoughtworks.com.

I'm also pretty suspect of this guy:
 * My name is Zachary Kniebel and I am a full-stack Web Application Developer and Software Developer, currently living in Philadelphia, PA. I have a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science from Northeastern University, and my primary focus and inspiration for my studies is Web Development. In my free time, I study human computer interface and the psychology of human computer interaction. I am both driven and self-motivated, and I am constantly experimenting with new technologies and techniques. I am very passionate about Web Development, and strive to better myself as a developer, and the development community as a whole.

... although as the latter hasn't contributed yet it is impossible to say with any certainty.

The thing in common with all these CVs is that they say nothing about the user's commitment to mathematics as such.

I did specifically reject one user's application to join recently (I was in a bad mood) as he presented a similar CV. We will never know whether I was correct in my assessment. --prime mover (talk) 07:30, 12 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Some people take any text box on the internet as a potential job application form, apparently. I say, no mercy. &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 15:44, 12 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Can someone take a second opinion on a bunch of 3 job applications currently sitting in our intray? Dismiss them out of hand, accept them with a view that they may be potential spammers, or reject with a polite email saying "Get lost, spammer!"? I tend towards the first. --prime mover (talk) 09:12, 24 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I rejected them all. I'm thinking it might be a good idea to tweak the account request form somewhat so as to make it less daunting (without a CV upload button, which I somehow suspect to be the cause of the problems we've been having). I'll ask Joe to update it. &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 10:08, 24 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Something like: "Please tell us what your interest is in mathematics, then (no less than 5 words)" should do it. Adding an apologetic note about how this is how we filter out the obvious spambots may also be a good idea. Apparently this aspect of  has been discussed not-completely-positively on e.g. Reddit (suggestions of elitism, and so on), although when I explained the spam problem to someone who subsequently joined us, the reaction was completely understanding and supportive. --prime mover (talk) 10:22, 24 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I've simplified the account request form. Now it's just username, email, and notes. We'll want to update the system messages to tweak some of the wording. --Joe (talk) 13:06, 24 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I've made some minor text edits, someone else may want improve them. --Joe (talk) 13:12, 24 July 2016 (UTC)


 * How easy would it be to get it to automatically email to the user: "Welcome to ProofWiki!" rather than making it so you have to type it in every time we press the "Accept" button? Apart from that, it looks fine. --prime mover (talk) 13:22, 24 July 2016 (UTC)

... Further research: in the "Confirm account requests " page, the "Biography" field is empty. Can we replace this with the contents of the "Additional Notes" field which is what the user has to type something into now? This could then also go into the user's home page. Maybe. --prime mover (talk) 17:33, 24 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I could change the field back to "Biography", however I wonder that will just deter people from signing up? --Joe (talk) 13:20, 25 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Well yes, that -- and besides, we don't want it to be a "biography", that's the whole point, people just post up their boring CV, and that makes it difficult to screen out the spambots. But an answer to "Why do you like mathematics?" demands something more creative and bot-proof. Till they get wind of it (here cometh the Singularity). --prime mover (talk) 18:42, 25 July 2016 (UTC)

How to cite ProofWiki?
How to cite a ProofWiki article in my work? Should I cite at all? --VictorPorton (talk) 18:10, 21 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Depends on the citation style you're using. I'd imagine you can cite it as you would any encyclopedia entry. Perhaps we could add a "Cite this" link at the bottom of each page one day? One that autoformats citations for MLA, APA, etc. Chandra (talk) 19:02, 21 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Never thought about it, never dreamed anybody would want to, we never thought we'd be citeworthy.


 * If anyone wishes to design and specify a citation style, the world is yours. --prime mover (talk) 20:40, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

Changing the "ProofWiki" first name use
When you share the ProofWiki main page anywhere, the LateX markup shows up for the first instance of "ProofWiki" on the page. Makes sharing it on Facebook, for example, rather ugly. I move to change the first instance of the site name with the lemniscate in it to just "ProofWiki" Chandra (talk) 19:02, 21 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Perhaps we could replace it with a graphic. --prime mover (talk) 19:05, 21 July 2016 (UTC)


 * How does that work? --prime mover (talk) 10:30, 24 July 2016 (UTC)


 * ... no, I see it does not. Anyone care to have a better try? I'm limited as to what FakeBook will allow me to do, I've compromised the usability of my account by being rude to Brexit scoundrels. --prime mover (talk) 10:37, 24 July 2016 (UTC)


 * We already have a graphic right next to the text. We could just put "ProofWiki" in bold Chandra (talk) 12:47, 25 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Do we really even even to make it look special. I say we just replace the markup with "plaintext". --Joe (talk) 13:24, 25 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I think the bold would make it look nice when on the main site without making the shared page ugly. And not just for the first paragraph, but also for the header bar above it. Chandra (talk) 17:22, 25 July 2016 (UTC)

Math on my wiki
I have started a new wiki site:

https://conference.portonvictor.org

Please explain which MediaWiki extension and which configuration should I use for displaying math on my wiki.


 * We use MathJax, via this MediaWiki extension. I don't know all the details, but it shouldn't be too hard.
 * NB. Please sign your posts so we know who said what and when. &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 19:48, 22 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I've installed MathJax on my site but rendering of math formulas is horribly slow: https://conference.portonvictor.org/wiki/Project:Sandbox Please help to investigate. --VictorPorton (talk) 20:38, 22 July 2016 (UTC)


 * For a start, you may find you need to use dollar sign delimiters in a MathJax installation on a MediaWiki site, as "math" delimiters do not always render properly. When we moved to MathJax from MediaWiki $\LaTeX$ we had to go through every single page and change them all. Kept us busy for a week or two. --prime mover (talk) 20:43, 22 July 2016 (UTC)


 * With dollar signs https://conference.portonvictor.org/wiki/Project:Sandbox has the same problem (renders too slowly, about 20 secs) --VictorPorton (talk) 20:45, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

It would appear that there is some built-in delay configured for MathJax; Chrome measurements show that after ~20 secs, the render command is triggered and subsequently completes in ~100ms. So please check if there's any configuration parameter which you have inadvertently set. Otherwise I don't know; you might try the MathJax mailing list or some other dedicated channel for further help. &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 20:55, 22 July 2016 (UTC)

Idea for categories/maintenance templates in user namespace
I just cleared out some user pages from Category:Tidy by putting the template calls in nowiki tags. But on second thought it might make more sense to enhance the various maintenance templates to exclude the User namespace (see this).

This will then exclude those pages from showing up in the categories, so they won't hamper us, but if e.g. a page is moved live from a sandbox (I've done this numerous times) it will automatically be included in the proper maintenance categories.

Thoughts? &mdash; Lord_Farin (talk) 11:19, 30 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Never realised how bad Category:Tidy had got again. Suppose I'd better get working on it. --prime mover (talk) 05:15, 1 August 2016 (UTC)