Talk:Glossary of North American railway terms/Archive 1

Catfish query

Should "C40-9W" in "Catfish" be "D9-40CW"? The NSR uses the latter designation, instead of the one preferred by other railroads and fans. I don't know if the "Catfish" moniker's been attached to the ES40DC, though.--Foxhound 00:10, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Incomplete List?

It seems mind-numbingly long to me.... --angrykeyboarder (a/k/a:Scott) 15:51, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

I agree, it appears to be a very old tag before the article was expanded to its present length. If anything, the list seems to be getting too long, with some rather obscure, presumably local, slang. I've removed the {{incomplete}}. Should anyone feel otherwise, let's discuss here. JGHowes ^talk - 20:07, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Dynamics

I am from New Zealand so I am not sure if your terminology is different to ours, but I think that "Regenerative" should be "Rheostatic". Regenerative braking feeds the power back into the national grid, wheras Rheostatic converts the energy to heat. I wont change it myself, but thought I should bring it up.Eonut 23:46, 30 July 2007 (UTC) Eonut

Warning: list will be reduced to a stub in February

Hi, could I ask interested editors to help out in finding and adding proper reliable sources to this article soon. I intend to remove all unsourced entries from this list in early February. This will result in the list being reduced to a stub. Thanks, Gwernol 20:16, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

I've seen the great majority of these terms in the rail press. I've added a few refs, and I'll be adding more through the week. Slambo (Speak) 12:34, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm close to half way through adding refs to the entries here. I've tried to restrict them to pages that show the definition either by explicitly saying something like "A foo is a bar..." or an image that includes a caption saying something like "This is a foo...", giving further weight to those references that appear in printed form rather than web-only. It's exceptionally likely that all of these terms would be found in the pages of rail magazines such as Trains (magazine), Railfan & Railroad, Railpace and any of a multitude of others; I just don't have time to scour through the various indices for these magazines within the deadline that was given above. Slambo (Speak) 20:14, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Slambo, you've done an outstanding job helping source this article. Many thanks. I'm happy to wait longer for further sources, given the number and quality of those you've provided. Bravo indeed. Gwernol 15:25, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, I've just gotten through a first pass adding refs to the majority of entries. Since there are now more entries referenced than not, I've removed the unref tag. I left the OR tag because there are still a few that I hadn't seen before and couldn't find easy references for (a situation that I intend to further research). Some of those that still don't have references, I have seen before but because the terms are so generic, they are difficult to find references (e.g. ALCOholic, Brick, Fathead, etc.). I don't see any terms that are completely off base from a railfan's perspective. Slambo (Speak) 19:31, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

List of U.S. railfan jargon

A proposed deletion template has been added to the article List of U.S. railfan jargon, suggesting that it be deleted according to the proposed deletion process. All contributions are appreciated, but this article may not satisfy Wikipedia's criteria for inclusion, and the deletion notice should explain why (see also "What Wikipedia is not" and Wikipedia's deletion policy). You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{dated prod}} notice, but please explain why you disagree with the proposed deletion in your edit summary or on its talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised because even though removing the deletion notice will prevent deletion through the proposed deletion process, the article may still be deleted if it matches any of the speedy deletion criteria or it can be sent to Articles for Deletion, where it may be deleted if consensus to delete is reached. Do you want to opt out of receiving this notice? Bolly Nickers (talk) 17:41, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

I removed the prod template because the previous AFD for this article resulted in Keep. Slambo (Speak) 18:02, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Correct name?

Should the name of this article be changed to "List of North American railfan jargon"? There seem to be quite a few Canadian references here. Or are these terms used exclusively by U.S. ralfans towards Canadian railways? Deckchair (talk) 09:28, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

I concur. Quite a few of these terms apply to both U.S. and Canadian railroads, and there are several Canadian-specific terms as well (for instance, Draper Taper and Red Barn). —BMRR (talk) 17:38, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Name change

I would like to propose that the name/title of this article be changed. I would suggest something along the lines of "Glossary of North American rail-related terminology." I realize that that's kind of wordy, but I'm certainly open to other suggestions. My reasoning behind this proposal is that many (most?) of these terms are used by professional railroaders as well as railroad enthusiasts, and also that quite a few of them apply to Canada as well as the U.S. Therefore, having "U.S." and "railfan" in the title of the article is not entirely accurate. —BMRR (talk) 17:43, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Given the article's content, I would agree too, but I think we should wait until the AFD runs its course. Slambo (Speak) 17:59, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

I'd agree with the 'Glossary...' alternative too (with the UK/NZ articles being updated accordingly). It was only while checking whether these pages really did break WP:NOT that I discovered Category:Glossaries! (I don't think that they do break WP:NOT, since Technical Glossaries are permitted lists...) Somehow this nomenclature makes it more official. EdJogg (talk) 18:16, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Any additional support for keeping this article or arguments for deletion should be added to the AFD page. Looking at the contribution histories of those who have joined the discussion, I find it interesting to note that the editors who are not regular editors of railway subjects but still advocated keeping the page are regulars on AFD pages, while those advocating for deletion are relatively new editors or have edited other highly focused subjects such as license plate history. Slambo (Speak) 18:33, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

I like the suggestion for changing the name. "Glossary" and "terminology" are definitely accurate words to use. How about "Glossary of North American railroad terminology"? I think its marginally easier to parse than "rail-related"? Gwernol 19:34, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree that "railroad terminology" looks and sounds better than "rail-related terminology." My only concern is that it would alienate Canada, where the majority of rail companies are known as railways rather than railroads. Conversely, using "railway terminology" instead of "railroad terminology" might bother some U.S. readers. Definitely worthy of more discussion. Perhaps we could take a vote. ;-) —BMRR (talk) 19:46, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Slambo - look at the previous deletion discussions for Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/List_of_UK_railfan_jargon_(2nd_nomination) and Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/List_of_US_railfan_jargon - both apparent sockfests. The current nominator and all three delete votes look just a little too familiar. Their interest in license plate articles is a big clue. KleenupKrew (talk) 20:52, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

railroad vs. railway

A few years ago when I started editing here, I would have been all for "railroad" to refer to North American practice. Since I've been here, I see quite a few more that use "railway" (e.g. Southern Railway (U.S.), Chicago and North Western Railway, BNSF Railway, Norfolk Southern Railway, not to mention all of the international rail transport articles that I've edited through work on Portal:Trains). At this point, I have no strong preference for either term, but railway is definitely not an unknown term in the US. Slambo (Speak) 20:01, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

"Glossary of North American railway terminology" looks good to me. —BMRR (talk) 17:43, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

simple solution, use railroad in US title, create similar title with railway and make it a redirect. UK one would use railway in title. Don't forget our Kiwi cousins have their own list too! Mjroots (talk) 17:55, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Now that the deletion hullabaloo is over, should we go ahead and change the title of the article? I nominate "Glossary of North American railway terminology" as the new title. —BMRR (talk) 22:33, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

Support -- though we need to keep the three article names in sync, so it's worth asking at the UK/NZ talk pages too.
EdJogg (talk) 12:35, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

I've done the move on this page, now to move the unsourced entries as stated elsewhere on this page. Slambo (Speak) 13:05, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Is the move of the UK and NZ pages on your todo list too? EdJogg (talk) 15:28, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

I saw another editor updating links, so I gave it a little time (and started another article that was on the redlink list) in case he moved them first. Since they haven't been moved yet, I'll go ahead and move them. Slambo (Speak) 15:39, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

 Done Slambo (Speak) 15:46, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Moving unreferenced entries

Unless there is wide disagreement, I'd like to move all of the unreferenced entries from here off the list into a holding area (which should be named something in accordance with the article rename discussion above) where we can keep them until we have verifiable and reliable sources for them (like is currently done on the UK list with its holding area). If there's a better way to keep notes on this information until its referenced, I'm open to suggestions. Slambo (Speak) 15:53, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. —BMRR (talk) 16:40, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

I've got no problem with that. Mjroots (talk) 13:18, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Unsourced entries from this article are now on Glossary of North American railroad terminology/unsourced. As references are added there, the entries can be moved back to the main list. Slambo (Speak) 15:47, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Style change

I would like to propose a minor style change to this article. If you take a look at the NZ and UK rail glossaries, you will see that each entry is in bold text, followed by the definition in plain text. I find that this greatly improves the readability of the glossary, and is also consistent with how most paper-based glossaries and dictionaries are styled.

I would be happy to take the time to make this style change if it's something that other editors agree with.

—BMRR (talk) 18:24, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

I also feel that there should be some kind of basic introduction at the top of the page, as is the case with the NZ and UK glossaries.

—BMRR (talk) 18:26, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Well, I wouldn't object to such updates. Anything (almost) that has the net effect of improving the page is good in my book. Slambo (Speak) 19:00, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Keeping the three articles in sync, style-wise, is a good move. On the UK page I also applied another convention: terms defined elsewhere on the page were highlighted as italics.

EdJogg (talk) 01:23, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

I went ahead and made the changes I proposed. I guess you could say I was being bold, literally. ;-)

—BMRR (talk) 02:29, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

Untitled

This list does not include unsourced terms; those can be found at Glossary of North American railroad terminology/unsourced. — Preceding unsigned comment added by EdJogg (talk • contribs) 15:25, 2 September 2009 (UTC)

updating and adding more sources

A note of thanks on my talk page recently for past work in adding citations to this list prompted me to come back and take another look. There are quite a lot of references added in my last go round that are now marked as potentially unreliable. I can only guess that this is from them citing web pages that are written by and for railfans. By the very nature of slang origins, it is pages like these that will be the first to explicitly state the meaning of slang terms.

I've gone through a few and added citations to published works or to sources that are not necessarily "railfan sites" but I would also counter that sometimes the best reference for slang is to show the term in use, and that sometimes its first published use (whether that be on a website or not) will be in the very recent past. Dictionary writers and lexicographers look to find uses and definitions for terms in the same way. I'm half tempted to add every page I find listing terms with potentially unreliable sources as a reference thinking that by showing just how many pages are using the term in that way it will add to the credibility of the multitude of sources for each term. Slambo (Speak) 12:12, 5 September 2015 (UTC)

@Slambo: First of all, thank you for all of your hard work on this! You've really helped to turn these glossaries around.

While I did not add the {{Unreliable source?}} tags, I agree with them 100 percent. The references in question include personal websites and social media. These are not reliable sources per WP:NOTRELIABLE. Therefore, I'm going to go ahead and remove them. In most of those cases, I believe you're already provided reliable references anyway.

I would discourage listing slang terms on this and the associated glossaries unless they are widely used. Otherwise, we lower Wikipedia's inclusion standard to that of Urban Dictionary—where folks now invent slang terms and submit them (as opposed to documenting preexisting slang terms, which was that website's original intent). That is original research, and not permitted per WP:NOR.

Listing "sources" that merely show slang terms in use is synthesis. Please stop doing that. Ideally, we should be citing rail-related dictionaries, glossaries, or gazetteers. Journal or magazine articles discussing a term would be equally acceptable, as would, say, a TV documentary that defines a term. – voidxor 23:10, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

I don't necessarily disagree with the unreliable tags, it's just that with a lot of modern terms coined in the last few years, they haven't been documented in the more established sources yet and personal sites and forum posts are where they appear so far. I've been avoiding personal sites and forum entries on this pass sticking to published works and corporate and government websites. But, in going through this again, my curiosity is raised to the point where I'm doing further research on my own and started a more involved description of terms on my website (with sources shown as well, following a very similar guideline for reliability in sources) beginning with highball. Slambo (Speak) 19:54, 15 September 2015 (UTC)

That's cool. Do continue to be mindful of WP:NOTRELIABLE (which also means we can't cite your website) and the fact that Wikipedia's a tertiary source, so our ideal sources are going to be secondary in nature. – voidxor 23:22, 15 September 2015 (UTC)

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