Talk:Style Guide

Re: "When to link wiki-articles vs when to link main site". I'm thinking maybe just link inside the wiki everywhere except for the article about the actual tool/page/etc? My assumption is that people generally want to "stay in the wiki" when clicking stuff but I might be wrong? --Pleu (4523550) (talk) 22:36, 2 March 2021 (CET)

Yes, I agree. Even if people want to have a link to the site, then it is only one extra click to go to the wiki page, then to the tool/page itself. I would also assume that references to the geocaching.com site are linked to the wiki page about geocaching.com too, unless it is a specific page (a bookmarklist, home location etc.). DrAcorn (15789140) (talk) 12:08, 4 March 2021 (CET)

"You" or "the user"

Some pages like BadgeGen have been changed from the second person to the third person - e.g from "Once you have Ruby or higher you will unlock Addons" to "Once the user has Ruby or higher they will unlock Addons". This is acceptable for formal writing like Wikipedia, but for an instruction manual like this I think referring to readers in the second person is easier to understand.

For example, "To achieve the diamond badge, you need to log 5000 finds", or better still "Log 5000 finds to achieve the diamond badge."

What do others think? Optimist on the run (6278087) (talk) 10:49, 14 December 2021 (CET)

I agree. I believe the current change comes down to whatever happened to feel natural to the user editing. Sadly most of us don't speak fluent and/or native English, which affects the flow. I know myself having issues expressing myself at least, sometimes re-ordering a sentence multiple times to achieve something that I feel readable. But, this is probably something to try keep in mind. I have personally been fighting myself on the matter of not having the texts sound like they are written by Project-GC, but by the community (third person), for example by avoiding all forms of "we have ...". --magma1447 (3305483) (talk) 10:59, 14 December 2021 (CET)

I'm constantly amazed by how fluent you and others are. The English (myself included) are notoriously lazy when it comes to learning other languages, but we expect others to learn ours. I think the best option is to write as best you can, and if necessary I can tweak it so that it sounds more natural. Optimist on the run (6278087) (talk) 12:12, 14 December 2021 (CET)

I started going through all the older pages and changing them from "you" to "the user" since it was said that the third person version was the preferred one. I know I did all in the BadgeGen-category at least and some other category too. But if we've changed our mind on this one I don't see a problem with reverting those changes. :) I know some of the badges sounded "wrong" and needed re-wording but I focused on "the user"-edits at the time. I agree that "Log 5000 finds to achive the diamond badge" is the best wording for the badges, better than both "you" and "the user". --Pleu (4523550) (talk) 19:30, 15 December 2021 (CET)

British or American English?

This jumped out at me while looking at the The Favorite Cacher page.

In British English, the word is spelt favourite, while American English opts to drop the u. Pages on this site seem to arbitrarily favour (<-- there's another one) one or the other depending on the author's nationality.

Do we wish to standardize the spelling? (Along with color/colour, et cetera.)

As Geocaching HQ is an American company, they have opted to call favourite points Favorite Points. For this reason I think it is reasonable to align with the American spelling. But I want to seek advice, first.

--Hügh (21934609) (talk) 02:56, 31 May 2023 (CEST)

The official language of Project-GC is American English. It's the default on the website itself. We haven't tried to enforce it on the Wiki pages, and I believe that we have only been asked about it once before. The decision to go with American English was made over ten years ago and I don't recall all the reasons. But the fact that Geocaching HQ speaks American English, has their website in it, and keeps their technical terms in American English is a valid one. Also, USA is a bigger market than UK and in general the world is more American English influenced today.

One reason to why the Wiki pages might be leaning more towards British English is the fact that Optimist on the Run has done a tremendous work correcting English and creating Wiki articles, and if I recall correctly, he is from the UK (or at least GB). I assume that it's hard to write in another "dialect" when you naturally speak the language.

So the conclusion is that it's preferred to write new texts in American English. It's also okay to edit texts from British English into American English, while definitely not required. Editing from American English into British English should be avoided.

--magma1447 (3305483) (talk) 09:57, 31 May 2023 (CEST)