User talk:JohnHawkinson

Yes, I'm barmar on SE. I'm pretty sure I've seen you there, too. Barmar (talk) 23:29, 17 April 2024 (UTC)

ip comments

Hi. Speaking as a totally different IP to the one that you just had to deal with, there's really usually no point creating an IP's User Talk page to communicate with them [...snipthe rest of my blather...] 172.71.242.160 11:26, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

I don't know why you think that there's no point. Some people have a stable IP, some people don't. Those that do will be shown the talk page automatically by MediaWiki. And others monitor Special:RecentChanges, as this IP editor may have (and as you did). And furthermore, the talk page was linked from User talk:Barmar in the thread the IP user was using. So for all those reasons, it sure seems to have a point to me. Thanks anyhow. JohnHawkinson (talk) 02:00, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

Unfortunately, nobody has a 'stable IP'. It's essentially whatever Cloudflare gateway one happens to be routed through, which is perhaps geographically grouped but otherwise semi-randomised within that group. I can't guarantee that this message will sign as 172.71.242.160 (I would heavily bet against it!), probably not within 172.71.242/8 (rare!), 172.71/16 is not likely, 172/24 is more like it (maybe .69-to-71-ish?), but landing off of the 172s (subranges of the 141s and 162s are always a reasonable side-bet) can happen even between one submission and an immediate "whoops, I forgot to sign" re-edit mere seconds later.

Conversely, I've replied to a prior IP's chat, before, and had the exact same anon-IP. Likely they were also in the UK, possibly even on the same ISP, but as even geolocation on my non-proxied IP (direct via such a "where am I?" site) often places me at one or other major UK city often hundreds of miles away, Cloudflare can't really help in either keeping 'me' constant or reliably separating 'us' from each other.

For those that monitor the changes, there is no advantage to creating an insta-out-of-date User Talk page, above any other manner of passing a note. This is in part a peculiarity of the way this Wiki is set up. There are plenty of discussions on these lines sitting in the Admin pages or random spots such as these. I've seen a few (and commented in some) over the years and until/unless either a configuration tweak (to immediately unproxy every IP reported) or perhaps a full update is attempted, one cannot even usefully say that those who have a stable IP at their end will ever have a (differently) stable IP reported at wikiside.

Exactly. "No advantage…above any other manner of passing a note." You have not proposed any other manner of passing a note, and it does not seem to have material disadvantages. Perhaps you'd like to suggest a different method of passing a note, but absent that, this one seems good, and better than no method. (I suppose the other obvious choice would be to clutter up my talk page with such, but I am disinclined to do that.) I was not aware that this wiki's CDN/whatever configuration breaks source IP address resolution; oh well, but that bumps IP talk pages from more-useful to equally useful (aka equally useless). JohnHawkinson (talk) 14:45, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

First, I absolutely apologise for this cluttering that I have instigated (I guess you also get an email notification, if not set otherwise?), and continue. Had you not posed a further question answerable issue, I had intended to stop at the last one (which was supposed to be brief!).

But you weigh up the relative lack of advantages, as is my point, forgetting the final sum of the disadvantages. User: and User Talk: spaces for IPs have no responsible owners to 'sub-moderate' them. Casual moderation by anyone and 'official' moderation by the fully accredited accounts (who can, and often have, delete the pages). In my mind, this tips the balance, even before considering more pernicious issues.

I agree, your wish to communicate with whoever-it-was is a somewhat insoluble problem. There is no more solution from creating an IP's Talk page, above highlighting it as you did by your (legitimate) comment on your (legitimate) edit. (That they landed on the opportunity to originally ingratiate themselves into your and Barmar's dialogue suggests they may, like me, be a bit of a casual page-change watcher. I don't believe the Random Page link could set them down there, etc.)

It would then be for the best not to add complexity from a needless additional disconnected notification (though you did not know that, quite as well as you now do!), if you'd accept my personal IMO/IME on this matter.

Not that I have authority here, clearly. 'Experience' is not a replacement for that, forgive me if you thought my attempt to smooth things down and brief you were anything more than passing helpfulness rendered overwordy and badly explained. And so there I shall stop, properly, and wish you well. 172.70.90.70 15:37, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

I cannot tell what you are proposing I do instead of using an IP talk page. You are being neither succint not clear. JohnHawkinson (talk) 15:41, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

Ok, drat, then the TL;DR; is... what you did here. That's the proposal. I saw that (and went looking for what had happened!), I then saw the other. Fairly likely they did too. Only real difference is character limits and any desire to get a response (which you wouldn't, understandably). HTH, HAND. *waves* 172.70.90.136 15:50, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

OK, thanks. I think we just disagree. I don't approve of using solely an edit summary for substantive comments and feedback. I recognize that my approach of using an IP talk page isn't reliable (and you've given me good reason to believe it's even less reliable than I thought), but it still seems to me the way to go. OTOH, if I hear that the messages are not only not reaching their intended target, but also are inappropriately popping up and chastising unrelated IP users, that might be good cause to re-evaluate the approach. Thanks. JohnHawkinson (talk) 15:56, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

(And actually more casual IP users will already not know to check "User Talk:<wh.at.ev.er>", or think to check the history/diffs for the response to their great big* boots creating great big muddy footprints all over the place and needing cleaning up. Some named users don't seem to know to check the usual places.) * - British phrase is often "Size nine boots", but I'm guessing you'd use an idiom that, at best, used US shoe sizing, whatever that equivalent is. And I wear 9s (9½s, maybe, sometimes even 10s, depends upon fit), so perhaps that's no longer suitable as "a big boot size".

Anyway, I wonder what IP this'll show as? Just done a Preview, and it says 172.70.90.93 (ha, nearly guessed 172.70.whatever, before I decided to actually test it!) but now let's see what an actual Saved reply will say, about one minute later... 172.69.43.222 12:44, 19 April 2024 (UTC) (( PS, if this has helped, or especially if it has not, I still think you're best to unclutter this small diversion from your userspace :p ))