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Hello, Jmvolc, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

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I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Questions, ask me on my talk page, or place {{helpme}} on your talk page and someone will show up shortly to answer your questions. Again, welcome!  — Johan the Ghost _seance 19:57, 3 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, I like the "Origins" information you added to Tonnage; that's a nice addition to the article.

But I was wondering, why did you remove the information about displacement tonnage? As far as I can see, this is a legitimate meaning of "tonnage", and is the standard for warships, for example. I note that you have added a link to Displacement, but this goes to a disambiguation page, none of whose options discuss displacement tonnage of shipping, so that isn't actually useful. So it seems to me that we've lost some information there. Please correct me if I'm wrong on this, but otherwise maybe we should re-introduce that. Cheers, — Johan the Ghost _seance 19:57, 3 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, thanks for the response. I appreciate that you haven't been around here too long (at least as a contributor), and I appreciate your efforts to improve Wikipedia. Having said that, a couple of pointers.

• Even accepting that displacement doesn't belong in tonnage, it would be better not to just delete a bunch of information without finding an alternative place for it first. There are procedures in Wikipedia for proposing that articles, or sections of articles, be merged or relocated; see Wikipedia:Merging and moving pages.
• Before making a major change to an article, it's best to place a message on the talk page to make sure folks are OK with it. You want to "ensure Wikipedia is collecting facts and not just a lot of opinions", and I quite agree; but by deleting a bunch of stuff without soliciting opinion first, you've made yourself the sole arbiter of what belongs in tonnage -- ie. your opinion decides. I appreciate your professional background, but you don't know about the backgrounds of other people here -- how do you know that I'm not the president of SNAME? OK, kidding! ;-) But seriously, if you want Wikipedia to be more learned, building a concensus is the best way to go.

I've responded to your other points in Talk:tonnage. Thanks again for your controibution here. Cheers, — Johan the Ghost _seance 10:49, 10 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hi again, I've responded to most of the points you raised on the article talk page, which is where we should discuss anything article-related, so that other people have a chance to chip in. Note that it's quite correct for an article to discuss the historical uses of a term as well as current uses, as long as they're clearly labelled as such.

Plagiarising style is not only OK, but highly recommended! In fact you can plagiarise anything from Wikipedia itself, since everything here is community-owned. But don't worry about formatting. If you put in the information, I'm more than happy to apply formatting to it.

Oh, BTW, on talk pages, please sign your entries with four tildes. This applies your user name as a link, plus the date and time. There's a "signature" button in the edit toolbar above the edit box that does this.

Cheers, — Johan the Ghost _seance 15:19, 16 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hi again, Thanks for adding those refs to tonnage. I've tidied the format up. As you'll see, they're added as general refs at the end, rather than being tagged against specific parts of the article; this makes them a little less useful, specially as few people will fork out the $280 or whatever for SDC! So, we could make them more useful by indicating which part or parts of the article are supported by which references. For example, right now, people can see that the PC/UMS bit is specifically supported by the canal tolls document. So, if you have the information, if you could indicate which bits of the article are supported by which refs, and maybe even the page number(s) in each case, that would be great -- just a bunch of notes on the talk page would be fine, and I could take it from there. It's a bunch of fiddly bookkeeping, but it helps us to demonstrate that we're meeting Wikipedia:Verifiability, which would help this article to eventually get featured status. Cheers, — Johan the Ghost _seance 14:51, 17 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I've replied on the hull speed talk page, and I think I have a suggestion that may lead to a satisfactory resolution. scot 15:39, 22 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I've done the rewrite of hull speed to concentrate on the speed/length ratio, and created redirects at speed/length ratio and speed length ratio. Have a look and see what you think. scot 20:45, 24 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Just to comment on an issue (I've noticed it's going a bit hot). Removing sections of text is generally unwelcome on WP. When removing a large section (which is correct), it would be best to add it to some other article. That seems to be the reason why edits on Hull speed haven't been accepted by some. When working with an oversized article (I've met with this problem on Submarine), it's best to copy a large removed chunk of text to a separate article. When the article is small, just leave the old part and clean it out only when the new one or another article can fully substitute it. It just helps to avoid conflicts, and this one seems unnecessary. CP/M 03:51, 27 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hi John, thanks for the message, which I take as a compliment! Just wanted to let you know that my net access is poor right now — I'm about to get on a plane for a long time — but I'll look into this as soon as I can. Cheers! — Johan the Ghost _seance 16:38, 27 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your explanations and clarifying edits to Hull (watercraft). They are comprehensible to laymen (such as me) without sacrificing precision. Now would you like to have a go at Squat (shipping term)? It needs someone with your expertise. Kablammo 02:35, 6 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well done! Kablammo 00:20, 7 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

J: A question has been posed at Talk:RMS_Queen_Mary_2#Gross_Tons_the_accepted_criterion_for_largest.3F concerning tonnage measurements. I have responded but would appreciate your review to see if correction or further elaboration is needed. Thanks. Kablammo 05:14, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hello. As you may know, there are a variety of infobox templates used for ocean liners; at least one of which is ill-suited to passenger vessels. As a consequence of a discussion I had with User:Ebyabe at User_talk:Ebyabe#RMS_Queen_Mary, Ebyabe has generously agreed to create a template for passenger vessels. It appears at Template:Infobox Commercial Ship. Its creator needs assistance with the fields for the template. For example, it will need a tonnage field, but would not need a displacement field. Should beam be moulded breadth, or extreme beam? Should length be pp, or oa? Given your expertise and interest in this area, would you be willing to particpate in the project? If so, go to Template talk:Infobox Commercial Ship and weigh in. It may be that different templates are needed for passenger ships (gt), freighters (dwt, net), containerships (TEU) and that one size will not fit all. Thanks for your interest. Kablammo 21:11, 4 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hello. There is a discussion going on at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Ships#Infobox_improvements regarding changes to ship infoboxes and their adaption to varied types of merchant ships, tonnage and displacement, and other fields to include in an infobox. (This is a different proposal than the subject of the section immediately above, which did result in the creation of a template for passenger ships, and its use on many articles.) If you choose, please weigh in with your thoughts on the project talk page linked above. Kablammo 19:52, 24 August 2007 (UTC):[reply]

Thanks for your note and ideas. There finally seems to be a movement to increase the utility of templates for non-naval vessels. We can hope that the effort does not bog down due to past friction between a some of the principal contributors. If you can help with suggestions to templates (and anywhere else) perhaps progress can be made, and Wikipedia can eventually become a useful general resource and reference for other types of vessels. Kablammo 13:07, 27 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There has been substantial progress made now. Your input would be helpful, as the template is close to being finalized. Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Ships#Continued_infobox_discussion As with the prior template earlier this year, there is discussion on whether the differentiate between power and propulsion, or handle everything under propulsion. I have been converted to your view that they are different, but others believe both items should be handled in the propulsion field. The templates themselves are accessible at Template:Infobox Ship Example. Thanks again for your expert assistance. Kablammo 15:03, 6 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It's good to see you check back in. If you have a chance, would you check the terminology in turret deck ship? I want to make sure I have properly used metacentric height v CG. (I always seem to come to you with these questions -- thanks for considering them.) Regards, Kablammo (talk) 23:05, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have finally responded to your comments there. Thanks for the assistance, and feel free to improve the article any way you wish. Kablammo (talk) 15:17, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm glad to see you adding to our nautical terms—I could certainly use the education myself! I am lamentably uninformed, and look forward to more. A request: could you revisit this article and add a sentence or two to clarify the relationship between the terms 'shell plating' and 'strakes'? I couldn't quite suss it out; as is, it looks like the article would be more appropriate called 'strake'. Appreciate your help. Maralia (talk) 19:49, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

...for your help at sea trial. My concentration on the article was mostly passenger ships. If you have information, especially in the "Noteworthy" section of the same article concerning other types of veseels, I would appreciate it. Just as an aside, had I not become an architect, I would have become a naval architect.Gary Joseph (talk) 01:04, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]