Wikiversity:Help desk/Archive 13

WHAT WOULD YOU CONSIDER TO BE THE MANDATE AND FUNCTIONS OF A MEDICAL SCHOOL IN A DEVELOPING COUNTRY LIKE SIERRA LEONE?
I AM NEW AND SEEM TO BE A BIT LOST (WIKIVERSITY NEEDS TO BE A LITTLE MORE IDIOT-PROOF!)

MY QUESTION IS: WHAT WOULD YOU CONSIDER TO BE THE MANDATE AND FUNCTIONS OF A MEDICAL SCHOOL IN A DEVELOPING COUNTRY LIKE SIERRA LEONE? THE ANSWER TO THIS QUESTION WILL NOT ONLY ASSIST ME WITH MY MASTERS IN EDUCATION RESEARCH, BUT WILL ALSO BE USEFUL FOR POLICYMAKERS IN TERIARY EDUCATION, SPECIFICALLY MEDICAL EDUCATION IN MY COUNTRY.

THANKS,

SYLP69


 * One basic thing should be the caps lock key and how to unset it. The answer to your actual question depends on what is needed in your country. Is there a statistic of diseases?  Gyro 16:31, 3 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Dont know nothing about the mandate, but the function is to heal people. And as it is a developing country after a war or during a war and it is hardly imaginable they will pay health insurance, it should have other resources. Healing for all, funding from some non-governmental organisation or the donations.--Juan de Vojníkov 21:01, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Why is there no signbot active?
Why is there no signbot active? Gyro 16:21, 3 January 2009 (UTC)


 * Well, the owner of the bot probably havent ask for a flag here. Should we invite him?--Juandev 18:11, 3 January 2009 (UTC)


 * YES Gyro 18:13, 3 January 2009 (UTC)


 * And one more question. What do you need from this bot?--Juandev 18:15, 3 January 2009 (UTC)


 * When there are more visitors here there will be more unsigned questions/contributions like the one above this one. It's very convenient not having to look at the history page to see if the comment was recent or if it is terribly outdated. Gyro 19:35, 3 January 2009 (UTC)


 * We did have a bot doing that, but it has not been active in long time. (see Special:Contributions/HagermanBot)  If you know someone who operates a bot, and would be willing to run it here, have them ask for a bot flag at WV:BOT.  --mikeu talk 22:20, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Just as a further comment, we do have a bot that automatically archives after 21 days, if it is still active. Historybuff 13:33, 5 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Yes, but this Q was about a bot to add missing signatures, not an archive bot. StuRat 15:13, 5 April 2009 (UTC)

So now I understand. Will we call for this robot?--Juan de Vojníkov 21:02, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Naming style
What's the correct naming style for the title: Learning_the_basics_of_French or Learning_the_Basics_of_French? I'm asking because I'm noticing in-wiki duplication because of inconsistant capitalization within an resource. (that is, Learning_the_Basics_of_French/Lesson:Au_restaurant! and Learning_the_basics_of_French/Au_restaurant!. Either path will require significant cleanup, and I might as well do work on them before it worsens. --Sigma 7 00:50, 17 March 2009 (UTC)

I think the former naming convention is the one generally used by wikipedia (e.g. Abundance_of_elements_in_Earth's_crust or Motion_of_no_confidence). This naming convention only capitalizes proper nouns and has fewer capitalization ambiguities, such as whether or not to capitalize prepositions longer than four letters. My personal suggestion is that the former style be used. Fizyxnrd 22:15, 28 March 2009 (UTC)


 * People may have different preferences... I would prefer natural sounding titles like yours use lower cases because inline links can easily be created. However, for a slightly more "proper" course title such as Basic French or French Basics, then I am not very sure. Hillgentleman | //\\ |Talk 15:20, 29 March 2009 (UTC)


 * If you accept the proposed policy Naming_conventions, then "Learning_the_basics_of_French" -- sentence casing -- is the correct naming style.
 * I also prefer lowercase letters, because they are easier to read than uppercase letters.
 * You may be interested in the brief description of "sentence casing" vs. "title casing" at b: Wikibooks:Manual of Style, which seems to recommend the other style you mentioned. --68.0.124.33 01:45, 28 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Naming Conventions was largely rejected by the community. It should not be considered a guide to Wikiversity conventions.  I personally prefer title caps be used, thus "Learning the Basics of French".  This is standard for course titles virtually everywhere.  The Jade Knight (d'viser) 17:27, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Culture insights from project GLOBE
--Puttykatlee009 21:20, 2 April 2009 (UTC) I am taking a class in Management and I need information on Asia and Europe. I need to do a comparison and contrast on culture and business climate from the perspective of a Multinational Corporation (MNC)seeking to expand into a new market. From Kathy Shorty


 * It seems problematic to throw all of Europe into one category and all of Asia in another. In the case of Europe, there's going to be considerable variation between places like the UK and Romania.  The variation is even larger in Asia, say between Israel and Myanmar/Burma.  However, I will attempt to make some general comparisons:


 * Europe tends to be capitalist, democratic, and transparent. Bribes are more likely to be required in Eastern Europe.  Most of Europe is free from a level of ethnic and religious tensions which are likely to impact business.  Environmental, health, and employment regulations tend to be strictly enforced in Western Europe.


 * Asia tends to be totalitarian and opaque. While nominally capitalist, other factors are likely to be more important when starting a business there, like developing a "relationship" with government regulators, which often involves bribery.  Ethnic and religious tensions can periodically erupt into attacks on Western businesses (particularly in Muslim nations), or warfare which can make operating a business impossible.  Environmental, health, and employment regulations are typically minimal and/or unenforced. StuRat 13:55, 4 April 2009 (UTC)


 * If you need. I am in Prague, Czech Republic. Create a page here on Wikiversity and leave me there some questions and/or points and I will leave ther something too.--Juan de Vojníkov 21:05, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Poster Presentation - affiliation with Wikiversity?
I have edited Wikipedia for a while but am new to Wikiversity. I recently had an abstract of original research accepted to be presented at a poster session at a local university. I am doing this research unfunded and with free licencsed software and plan to create a Wikiversity page and publish the research here.

First, is it possible, appropriate and/or sane to have my affiliation for the poster be with Wikiversity?

Second, has anyone done that before?

The session is very informal, though the poster has the option (up to the authors) of having the poster published on their website. If I chose to allow them to publish the poster on the site, is it still fair to publish the project in Wikiversity (I am assuming yes as it is developing research) but is it possible/appropriate to use the Wikiversity logo/affiliation if I say yes to publishing the poster on their website? This question was added on 02:30, 9 April 2009 by User:Enviropearson.


 * This Q would be better placed on the Colloquium, as this Help Desk is for general knowledge questions, like "Which country has the largest fishing fleet".  I will move this Q to that page for you. StuRat 13:31, 9 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Here it is: Colloquium. StuRat 13:39, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Geometry/Trig for survey work...
Does anyone know if there's a guide to laying out railroad/highway curves based on survey lines available online or as a Wikibook?

The techniques needed could also on a smaller scale be used for paths, driveways and model railroads..


 * What do you mean by "survey lines" ? Do you mean lines of constant elevation ? StuRat 23:46, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

Interactive learning
Is it possible that wikiversity supports some additional media such animated flash pages, and scripting features as in JScript. The reason I suggest this is to facilitate the learner with all possible ways to browse and interact with some self pre-programmed study. An example of this is identifying locations and related points on an image or a map.--Email4mobile 16:50, 22 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Not as far as I know, no. The problem with such complex teaching tools is that they run counter to the wiki philosophy of allowing anyone to edit.  The type of thing you describe wouldn't be easy for the average user to edit, would it ?  As an alternative, you could have a map with numbers on it, and the user could be asked to pick from a list of all the numbers below the map.  Each number could then have an HTML link that would take you to a page which lists the name of the city, state, province, nation, etc., and of course, a link back to the map page.  If your links to Chicago and Detroit were mixed up, then, anyone could easily fix them.  Changing the map itself (with the numbers on it) would be a bit more work, but still relatively simple compared with changing a Flash program. StuRat 16:16, 23 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Thanks for sharing opinion but I don't think it will be necessary to edit a flash portion again because it will be like an animated GIF photo with more enhanced features. This means the page will remain the same standard except that you can embed or insert such ActiveX as a flash movie just like embedding in an HTML page. The reason I raised this idea is when I saw Microsoft Encarta using such flash animations in their articles, I thought it will be an interesting way of teaching, especially when lessons require more explanations (sometimes 3D maneuverable animations). Anyhow, animated GIFs can still fulfill our needs.--Email4mobile 17:49, 29 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Right, but Encarta doesn't follow the wiki model of allowing anyone to edit. There are many problems with just having one person responsible for the creation and maintenance of the material.  Here are a few:


 * 1) Mistakes aren't corrected as quickly, since they must wait for that one person to discover and fix the mistake. Leaving a note for them may help, but only if they check back here frequently.


 * 2) Eventually that single person will leave Wikiversity. Either they will go on to do something else or no longer be able to participate, etc.  At that time, we want others to be able to take over, not just leave the project abandoned.


 * 3) There could be disagreements over the content, in which case we want to consensus to win, not always the opinion of the person who happens to know how to make Flash animations. StuRat 20:23, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Erm...
The Wikiversity School of Interviewing doesn't really seem to be functional, and personally, I think it should be deleted. Renaissancee 22:28, 2 July 2009 (UTC)


 * The best place to request a deletion is at Requests for Deletion. StuRat 00:43, 3 July 2009 (UTC)