Hitchwiki:Community Portal/2007

Deletion of content
Hey i put an article on hitch stop signs and even referenced it. MtTweak deleted it becasue: 1. It had some German quotes (which were translated). No where does it say content has to be in english. 2. He did not undserstand it. the idea was to have a road sign like a bus stop but to show where it was safe to hitch hike. As I am travllening I could not do much more on it. I think that the deletion was too hasty. There was no discussion!!! The fact that it linked to another project on hiking was also removed with a claim the link did not work!!

I also see MrTweak reformated an article i submitted on the search for the commons to remove the contact details for the hitching project, I put there. He did this under the title formatting. I've no problem with formating to make it easier to read or for house style. But these seem hasty and not useful. Its Markus here - not logged in under my name. Perhaps we can discuss this so that marked for deletion stays up for a short while like in Wikipedia and is not removed with no chance for defence! / development.
 * Alright, I restored the page for now. However I think the information would rather fit in the article liftershalte.
 * I reformatted The Search for the Commons because it was just a copy&paste of a quoted E-Mail, including a > in every line and some special characters that formatted the text totally wrong, which made it almost unreadable.
 * If you insert unfinished articles here, it would be good, if you put a little note about that, or at least log in before posting, so I can see it's you, because most anonymous users never come back. --MrTweek 23:08, 17 April 2007 (CEST)


 * I also think this article should go. It's nothing but information on a prospective liftplaats. At most a small section on the liftershalte page if you really think that it's that important. Zac talk 17:27, 29 April 2007 (CEST)

Route information, e.g. Paris to Berlin
I was wondering if we could somehow improve the information on this site by adding content regarding routes, not only places. For example, if someone travels from Paris to Berlin, he/she should write a page about this route, mentioning the best places to HH, shops with best prices, hostels etc. TruckThor 12:10AM 23APR2007 EEST(GMT+2)


 * Good idea! I have similar ideas, and on Wikitravel they something like that as well. Just start one and see how it works out! :) Guaka 11:22, 24 April 2007 (CEST)


 * I don't know - if for example you hitch from Paris to Berlin there is no fixed route. You have a different trip everytime and you have to be flexible. Also there is an infinitely amount of routes - where do we start, where do we end? I think we should have only informations on how to get to an important point and how to go on from there so one can puzzle together every possible route from that. Speckmade 18:48, 27 June 2007 (CEST)


 * Well, you're probably right. And the fact that nobody started the article is also a good indication. However, today I was thinking that we should copy Wikipedia articles about highways. There's tons of extremely useful information in them, and it will be great when we start adding specific info about gas stations and on-ramps. Guaka 21:51, 27 June 2007 (CEST)

spamming
''moved to Hitchwiki:Spam

Hitchwiki:Why we work on Hitchwiki
Fellow hitchhikers, I love this project! And I guess I'm not the only one. So I decided to start a page where we can write about Hitchwiki:Why we work on Hitchwiki! Guaka 09:10, 17 May 2007 (CEST)

Tickets on public transport
I'm just wondering wether we should add information about using public transport without valid tickets (actually I already did). I'm sure this information might be very useful, but might also make us look a little shady. In some cases it might even be illegal. What do you think --MrTweek 09:58, 22 June 2007 (CEST)


 * I think basic info is okay, but maybe we need a warning page somewhere? And possibly a real disclaimer in this case? Also, we should link to organizations that are striving for free public transport, and maybe that should be the title of the "warning" page. :) Guaka 20:07, 23 June 2007 (CEST)

More attention to general articles
I thought it would be good to have more attention on general information. I changed the sidebar a bit for that. Let me know if you like it, or not... Guaka 20:51, 25 June 2007 (CEST)

Template for City pages

 * moved :) Guaka 16:03, 17 August 2007 (CEST)

Different names of cities in other languages
Hey, today I found out that there a dozen of other names of cities in other languages. This wikipage shows the most of them. I guess that we should at least redirect city names not from all languages (would be a lot of work) but from the most essential. Here the next question comes up, which languages are essential? I think redirects of city names in English, French, Spanish, German and Russian would cover the most at the moment. Any suggestions? platschi site, wikitalk 14:45, 13 September 2007 (CEST)

IRC channel or message board
I was thinking last night while at work that it would be really nice if we had an IRC channel. I love the wiki, but I think that a channel would help strengthen our community. A message board I'm not quite as sure about, because I hate sites that try to serve content via a board, but I'd be willing to mod a punBB or something to integrate well with the wiki so that we didn't "split" our content or do away with talk pages. I'm already idling #hitchwiki on Efnet (I'm Gh0ul) if anyone is interested in it! Zac talk 15:05, 17 August 2007 (CEST)
 * IRC would be fine for me. Maybe we can also use a jabber chat room (should also be compatible with google talk). I'm not sure if i like EFnet, yet, but I think I could live with it ;)
 * I really don't want a message board, that's hard to combine with a wiki in a senseful way. --MrTweek 21:25, 17 August 2007 (CEST)

Pictures of the now
I just thought about replacing the pictures of the now by random images. something like that: http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:RandomImage what do you (all) think? --MrTweek 21:25, 17 August 2007 (CEST)


 * Sounds good to me. Zac talk


 * Good idea, if you find the time to do it sometime. I'd rather first see OpenID :) guaka site, wikitalk 21:41, 12 September 2007 (CEST)

User Details
Is my email address publicly visible - if not, is it visible to those who register as users? --System.Exception 19:25, 29 August 2007 (CEST)
 * No, it is visible to nobody. You just have to enter it for verifying your account, or in case you lost your password and stuff --MrTweek 08:38, 30 August 2007 (CEST)


 * Well, actually it's probably visible to anyone with access to the actual database (not the database dumps) of Hitchwiki: MrTweek and myself (if I can find the login to the server again :) guaka site, wikitalk 21:41, 12 September 2007 (CEST)

Happy to see this wiki - Multilingual coordination
I was justly thinking in my way from Croatia to France today that it should be great to have a wiki about hitchhaking and I see that it's done!. Unfortunaly my english is not good enough (OK i'm a french guy) to participate on it but it is steel a really good thing. I know a website in french http://hitching.free.fr/ wich have realy good information about where to do auto stop in the cities. Someone should translate it. This wiki site now have some informations in english. But it needmore help for a good english translation (ben the webmaster). --Kimdime69 22:18, 5 September 2007 (CEST)
 * If there is enough interest, we would be glad to start a french version of hitchwiki (there is already a spanish one). However I don't speak french, so it would be important that at least 1 or 2 people are responsible for taking care of it. Just let me know --MrTweek 22:44, 5 September 2007 (CEST)
 * Well I will not be the good man to start a french version, if there is one maybe I would participate but I'm quite sceptic about the viability of such thing when I see than even in the english version there is so much to do. --86.200.233.223 15:05, 6 September 2007 (CEST)
 * I'm interested in a French version. My French is waning and I need a chance to practice it, so I'd love to work on translating pages. Zac talk 23:29, 6 September 2007 (CEST)


 * Bon, let's do it. I'm happy to keep an eye on it and help with some rough translations, and to communicate between the English and the French project. Alors, http://fr.hitchwiki.org, on y va? guaka site, wikitalk 04:51, 7 September 2007 (CEST)


 * It would probably be cool to get some Babel template stuff here, from Wikipedia. guaka site, wikitalk 04:58, 7 September 2007 (CEST)


 * Alright, I've set up http://fr.hitchwiki.org/ and http://de.hitchwiki.org/. I would suggest to create at least basic Main Pages before announcing them. I don't speak any french, so I'll leave it to you. It would be good to find some native french speaker as an admin. Please do not announce the German version yet. I will do that, after clarifying some organisational things with the guys from abgefahren. --MrTweek 11:17, 10 September 2007 (CEST)
 * Oh, and your logins work on all languages, of course. But admins/sysops/etc are not identical. --MrTweek 11:23, 10 September 2007 (CEST)


 * Great great great! I just started Multilingual coordination :) guaka site, wikitalk 20:38, 10 September 2007 (CEST)

Truck companies
I think that there should be a place to write down witch truck companies that drives from witch places to witch and when. We all have some numbers to truckdrivers, not putting them on display here of course but telling the rout, company and times to role... I am googeling companys right now driving Paris to Barcelona, but I cant find anything in english... Anyone ideas about how to google or companies that might drive?
 * I'm not so sure if that information might really be so useful. Truck are always the slowest way to get somewhere, so I usually try to avoid getting picked up by trucks, especially when leaving big cities. Also, there are probably a lot of trucks on major routes like Paris->Barcelona every day. jm2c --MrTweek site, wikitalk 16:06, 14 September 2007 (CEST)


 * On the other hand, it is a certain way to get somewhere. From Paris to Barcelona is hard to do during the daylight of one day (even on the 21st of June), so going with a truck would be a very good alternative. Maybe it would be good to know if there are companies that are likely to help hitchhikers somewhere.  I have never tried it myself though... and I probably wouldn't. I don't like planning so much :) guaka site, wikitalk 18:17, 14 September 2007 (CEST)

international start page?

 * moved to Hitchwiki talk:Start Page

Google Maps plugin
Maybe this is worth checking out: http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:Google_Maps It might be the way for even more integration between liftershalte and hitchwiki! guaka site, wikitalk 01:34, 24 September 2007 (CEST)
 * Wow, it has improved a lot since i checked the last time. I'll see what I can do. Any good ideas how to improve it? --MrTweek site, wikitalk 09:35, 24 September 2007 (CEST)

political borders vs. cultural borders
I'm just thinking about how we should treat borders. In my opinion, cultural borders are more important than political borders. For example in Ireland, there is a political border, but it is open, and even the locals don't see this as a real border. Also, I'm sure there is no difference between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland, regarding to hitchhiking. So I want the atricle Ireland to cover the whole Island and put a note about this in the article Northern Ireland. I'm not sure, wether there are other countries whith such a situation (maybe Belgium?) --MrTweek site, wikitalk 10:36, 24 September 2007 (CEST)


 * We have to define clear guidelines for that. If we don t we soon get confrontated with Spanish Regions who want to be independen (Katalunia, Basque Country, Galicia, etc.) We have to state somewhere how we decide on those issues.

I would recommend to take the official definitions of countries and link in Ireland to the Northern Ireland Article and Vice Verse - might be easier for the search as well. Fabzgy 18:30, 25 September 2007 (CEST)
 * Of course, we need to link them in both directions anyway. But I'm wondering wether we should put content into the article of northern Ireland. Because there won't be any difference between northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. That's why I would use the article Ireland for the whole island, and leave northern Ireland as it is, a short article with some references where to find information. My proposal in general would be: Create article for the political regions, and in case there is something special about hitchhiking in a certain cultural region, we can make another article and link it whereever possible. I.e. like in the German hitchwiki, there is an article about Lapland, which is a region in Sweden, Finland and Norway. This would mean, Katalunia, Galicia, etc can have their own articles, if hitchhiking is different there. --MrTweek site, wikitalk 09:28, 26 September 2007 (CEST)

new to hitchwiki
Well I am new on the Hitchwiki, I would like to contribute my time and energy to assist others who maybe oneday would come to my country sierra Leone.I am a couchsurfing memeber( Id :SAHR).

I would also like to participate with ohers in this forum.

regards, john
 * You are very welcome to contribute to hitchwiki. You might have seen that there is no information about Sierra Leone yet. It would be really cool, if you could add something. If you want to work here a little more, it might be senseful to create an account. --MrTweek site, wikitalk 19:18, 26 September 2007 (CEST)

URLs?
It seems as if there is a problem with URLs, e.g. http://hitchwiki.org/index.php?title=Main_Page, which should be http://hitchwiki.org/Main_Page... guaka site, wikitalk 18:25, 27 September 2007 (CEST)
 * Yes, and I'm pretty sure I told you about that a few days ago ;) It's not really a Problem, because the short URLs still work. Since the mediawiki-update, they are just generated wrong, sometimes. I will fix that --MrTweek site, wikitalk 19:26, 27 September 2007 (CEST)

cooperation with hopsitalityclub
What do you think about cooperation with other websites and web communities based on the idea of open world? For example Hospitality Club ( www.hospitalityclub.org ) - something absolutely great for hitchhikers and for other people too. I've got a vision - great community of web 'open world' communities, cooperating with each other and helping their members to enjoy our beatiful planet fully.


 * HC is NOT a democratic organisation! That said, it IS a great travellers' and hitchhikers' community. --Fverhart 12:04, 28 September 2007 (CEST)


 * We have a discussion about this stuff running on Hitchwiki_talk:Organization. We really do support the idea of an "open world". Well, unfortunately hospitalityclub is not so open, but more like a dictatorship. At the moment we are only discussing about cooperation with bewelcome and maybe wikivoyage. However, if you have good ideas how to cooperate with hospitalityclub, just let us know. We are always open for any kind of cooperation --MrTweek site, wikitalk 12:10, 28 September 2007 (CEST)


 * I strongly object any cooperation with Hospitality Club. The Organization is a mess. Veit will answer your first three E-Mails (if you are lucky) and then it s gone ... I m in favour of | BeWelcome but thats known I guess. Fabzgy 18:18, 29 September 2007 (CEST)


 * He never responded to any of my emails, but well, even though I tried to be constructive, I wasn't expecting any response ;) guaka site, wikitalk 16:34, 2 October 2007 (CEST)

reCAPTCHA
I just installed the reCAPTCHA plugin on the Crash at Mine Wiki. It took me less than 4 minutes. I think it will keep out spam for a while. I think it's a good idea to do the same here. guaka site, wikitalk 16:34, 2 October 2007 (CEST)
 * I just installed it, and it seems to work. There will be a captcha now when registering an account, and when adding links to an article without being logged in. --MrTweek site, wikitalk 11:10, 3 October 2007 (CEST)

Hitchwiki GFDL?
As Wikipedia states we are using GFDL but thats not true, isn t it? We are Using CC as far as I know. Fabzgy 18:30, 25 September 2007 (CEST)


 * No, it is in GFDL. This is also stated at the bottom of every page. --MrTweek site, wikitalk 09:28, 26 September 2007 (CEST)


 * I'm taking this back from the history, since there's a relevant issue here. It would be nice if people can take stuff from here and use it under the CC-BY-SA license. So I just created Template:User cc-by-sa for this purpose. Just add   to your user page if you want to dual-license your contributions as well. guaka site, wikitalk 16:41, 2 October 2007 (CEST)

What about switching the license interior? I just removed the thing because my question was answered, sorry if that was too early Fabzgy 01:45, 4 October 2007 (CEST)


 * Well, we can't just change the license, because over 100 people have contributed (in fact, it's based on Hitchhiker's Guide to Hitchhiking, and I never heard anything from the guy who founded that, though Salman from digihitch knows more about it, and apparently he's Finnish), and we should ask all of them for their permission.
 * It's better to archive discussion like these now and then. People might find answers in stuff like this in the future, either through Google or the internal wiki search functionality. guaka site, wikitalk 01:52, 4 October 2007 (CEST)