File talk:Early Aramaic character - Alaph.png
(Redirected from File talk:Paleo-hebrew - alef.png)
Renaming proposal[edit]
This and the other files listed below were derived from a file on Wikipedia which has been renamed (moved), as per w:en:Wikipedia:Files_for_deletion/2011_March_15#File:Paleo-Hebrew.PNG, from w:en:File:Paleo-Hebrew.PNG to w:en:File:Early Aramaic characters.png
Consequently this and the other files listed below should be renamed (moved) too. I propose that in each file name:
- “Paleo-hebrew” be replaced with “Early Aramaic character”, and
- the letter name, currently the modern Yiddish pronunciation of Hebrew letter names, be replaced with Aramaic letter names in accordance with w:en:Aramaic_alphabet#Imperial Aramaic alphabet.
The proposal is listed below in datail.
Dan Pelleg (talk) 09:50, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
Discussion[edit]
- לא הצלחתי להבין. זה אותיות פיניקיות, לא ארמיות.
These files were derived from a table comparing very similar alphabetic systems: the glyphs displayed in the second column from the left are labelled early Phoenician letters, those in the third Moabite letters, those in the fourth Hebrew ostraca letters, those in the fifth – from which these files were derived – are labelled early Aramaic. Since these files are used in many articles for exactly this kind of comparison (between closely resembling alphabetic systems), they must be labelled correctly according to their source. מקור הקבצים האלה בטבלה שמשווה בין מערכות אלפבית קרובות מאוד זו לזו: עמודה שניה משמאל מכילה אותיות פניקיות מוקדמות, השלישית אותיות מואביות, הרביעית אותיות אוסטרקון עבריות, החמישית – שממנה לקוחים הקבצים שבהם מדובר כאן – אותיות ארמיות מוקדמות. מאחר שהקבצים הספציפיים האלה משמשים במאמרים רבים בדיוק לאותו סוג של השוואה (בין אלפבתים דומים מאוד), יש לכנות אותם בשמות הנאמנים למקור.
- I guess so -- I'm not too good with Google Books, but I have the "Reading the Past: The Early Alphabet" book open on my lap right now (ISBN 0-520-07431-9). The one that very clearly allows you to see which column it's from is
. By the way, what I would really like to rename is all the files which have "Proto-Semitic" in their name, since there's no such thing as a "Proto-Semitic alphabet"[sic] at all (what they actually are is somewhat speculative reconstructions of Sinaitic / early Canaanite letters)... AnonMoos (talk) 07:43, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
- Yes... But let's take one step at a time ☺ I think this case is a straightforward matter of simple accuracy in reference to a source. Dan Pelleg (talk) 16:36, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
- I guess so -- I'm not too good with Google Books, but I have the "Reading the Past: The Early Alphabet" book open on my lap right now (ISBN 0-520-07431-9). The one that very clearly allows you to see which column it's from is
- I support Dan's proposal for renaming. Does seem straightforward. RickP (talk) 11:48, 20 May 2011 (UTC)
- Looking at the source cited, I understand that Early Hebrew and Aramaic scripts were based on the Phonecian script, then later the mainstream Jewish community abandoned that early Hebrew script and adopted the Aramaic script. In that sense the Aramaic script is a proto-Hebrew script, it is what the current Hebrew script evolved from? So a description of Paleo-Hebrew is not wrong? If it is not a 'wrong' description, then it is not an acceptable reason for a mass rename of files (see Commons:File_renaming), the proposals are simply a matter of "better" names. File names do not have to reflect the source of the images, that sort of information belongs in the file description page (in multiple languages). --Tony Wills (talk) 01:21, 26 May 2011 (UTC)
- "Proto-Hebrew" would imply "predecessor of Hebrew", whereas "Palaeo-Hebrew" implies an "old type of Hebrew" – the first states: "something different, albeit a precursor", the second: "the same thing, just from an earlier time". As noted above, these files are often used in tables comparing very close alphabets with very subtle differences, so their names should reflect the accuracy provided by the source, not regress to cruder approximations. And if the source classifies these glyphs as "Aramaic", then it's not within our competence as Wikipedia editors to assess how significant this distinction is – it's not up to us to decide if the source's names are "just slightly better" names or, in fact, "more correct" (i.e., "less incorrect") ones. If readers are to regard Wikipedia as trustworthy and reliable, we should take the trouble to stick to our sources ☺ Dan Pelleg (talk) 13:18, 29 May 2011 (UTC)
- These are not names of articles, they are just handles for referencing their contents. I don't see any reason the filename should have anything to do with the source of an image, most do not. People are forever wanting to rename files to make them a little more precise, or conform with their pet naming scheme. The main effect of renaming files is to shake off a few more references to the file which will no longer find the contents where they used to be (we endeavour to change all wiki-links, but references which weren't wiki-linked, in discussions, in logs, in the uploader's gallery etc won't change, and we can't change any links out there in the wider internet). So we will retain file redirects of the old filenames to the new ones, and have to fend off the inevitable assaults on those redirects as new generations of editors try to delete them as "unused" (some see no value in maintaining the historical record ;-).
- However precise, a filename is (usually) only in one language. One finds files using a search function which searches description pages which can have the description in multiple languages - that is where precise descriptions, referencing the source, author, dates etc etc, should be.
- PS By some irony the parent file w:File:Paleo-Hebrew.PNG proves my points, the file has disappeared - renamed and the redirect deleted [1] :-(. So all the files under discussion here refer to a file that can not easily be found (casual users are not going to guess it was only a file on en:wiki and are not going to know that the only trace of it is in logs there). Of course now that I have pointed this out someone will correct all references to the old name (good luck :-), while they're at it the descriptions should be 'corrected' from Paleo to Aramaic etc :-). But my point is this is not unusual, this is the normal unforseen (but predictable) effect of renaming files - we try to repair instances where we know the filename is used, but by definition can not repair other instances. This is why I encourage renaming files only where strictly necessary or before the files have had a chance to be widely used or referenced. --Tony Wills (talk) 21:53, 1 June 2011 (UTC)
- "Proto-Hebrew" would imply "predecessor of Hebrew", whereas "Palaeo-Hebrew" implies an "old type of Hebrew" – the first states: "something different, albeit a precursor", the second: "the same thing, just from an earlier time". As noted above, these files are often used in tables comparing very close alphabets with very subtle differences, so their names should reflect the accuracy provided by the source, not regress to cruder approximations. And if the source classifies these glyphs as "Aramaic", then it's not within our competence as Wikipedia editors to assess how significant this distinction is – it's not up to us to decide if the source's names are "just slightly better" names or, in fact, "more correct" (i.e., "less incorrect") ones. If readers are to regard Wikipedia as trustworthy and reliable, we should take the trouble to stick to our sources ☺ Dan Pelleg (talk) 13:18, 29 May 2011 (UTC)
![[1]](https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Log&page=File%3APaleo-Hebrew.PNG){kind=link}
- Tony, I believe your misgivings concerning general naming issues are probably justified in most cases. But they don't apply in this case: the reason these specific names need to be consistent with their sources is that they should be consistent with their contents, which is correctly denoted in their source, whereas any other denotation is simply false, and is the immediate reason for false contents in articles.
- This is why this is important: currently, in articles, it's being taken for granted that these file names convey reliable information as to what they depict: tables comparing this alphabetic set to others title it "Paleo-Hebrew", which is incorrect. Again: to judge how meaningful or negligible the distinction is between "Paleo-Hebrew" and "Early Aramaic" is not within a wikimedia editor's competence. Especially, since the context in which this information is usually given is a comparison between subtly different glyph sets, where subtle differences are not trivial, but are in fact the focus.
- Concerning wikilink-correction: in this case I would make a point of not changing the wikilinks in foreign language projects, exactly because this would render the renaming pointless. This renaming should have the potential of alerting editors that these files were incorrectly titled, which has resulted in incorrect information within articles. Project-local editors should make the necessary changes in their articles, hopefully not merely changing the wikilinks, but also correcting the relevant information.
- Language-specific accuracy is in this specific case also irrelevant, since these names are scientific lingua franca.
- As you predicted, I re-referenced the original file. I'll take care the references stay intact also here. Let's not make this technicality a reason for not renaming. The reason, by the way, the redirect was erased (which was indeed uncalled-for), was probably that for years no articles have been using that file on the English Wikipedia. As long as usage of these files persists, I don't think people will be erasing their histories.
- Again, let's please not make this a general policy discussion. The main grounds for objecting here shouldn't be a general opposition to said undesired tendencies in commons. There's no personal "pet naming scheme" (no scheme at all for that matter), and (as established twice above) the issue is not trivial, but has direct repercussions on article contents conveying accurately sourced information versus being false or at least sloppy, which we also don't want wikipedia to be.
- To sum it up: it is strictly necessary to rename these files, otherwise articles in multiple projects in many languages will continue to contain incorrect information relying on these files' wrong names. The significance of the distinction is not up to us to judge. Dan Pelleg (talk) 13:11, 19 June 2011 (UTC)
Interim on July 2nd 2011[edit]
Support:
Oppose:
